She lived there for twenty-three years. Might I do as much? My mind raced toward fluid arches and diamond pane windows set aglow with beeswax tapers. Polished oak paneling to warm the walls, and brickwork to ornament its exterior. I would change the entrance and expand the drive to encompass a park. The stewpond and the mill may stay as they are. Yes. I could see it all in my mind’s eye. How it might come alive in its renewal. Alive with the voices of children and families. Alive, too, with the mass in its chapel. Alive and not gone completely.
Snapping open my eyes, my gaze fell upon a tapestry with just such an idyllic setting, and my spirits fell. Would I ever be able to forget that the stones beneath my feet were sacred, that their walls housed prayers and sacrifice? Would I ever be as worthy to live within those walls as Isabella surely was?
“My lord…”
My servant William entered tentatively, knowing my mood of late. “There is a messenger from the king’s commissioners, my lord. From Brewood.”
So it came at last. Blackladies’ surrender. Would it be prudent to make a visit, or would it be unwelcome to those who must be dispossessed? There is nothing quite as loathsome as the presence of a landlord when the tenants are turned out.
“Bring him in, William,” I said.
After a few moments, the liveried man entered, bowed, and handed me the missive. It was from that horrible Legh. In his obsequious hand, I read that Blackladies surrendered on the 16th and that they only awaited the nuns to vacate. No doubt they awaited their relatives to spirit them away. Perhaps it was time I did pay a call on Blackladies…while it was still Blackladies.
ISABELLA LAUNDER
NOVEMBER, 1539
Blackladies
XXIX
Remove not the ancient landmark which your fathers set up.
–Proverbs 22:28
“Are you ready?”
I heard Thomas speaking and yet I did not recognize him at all. He stood behind me in the haze of my remembrance, for all my thoughts were of memories now. I felt my veil flapping outward, reaching for him like a desperate hand. I tugged on it. It behaved like a sail, and I longed to let it fly, with myself flying away with it.
“Isabella, are you ready?” he said again.
Surely this was what an executioner says before he takes you to the gallows. And of course, at that moment, you are never ready. I considered Sir Thomas More. I heard he was a noble gentleman as he walked to his death, speaking no treason even unto the last. Beheaded. Martyred. Good God. “Will they take the roof, do you think?” I asked dazed, thinking of beheadings.
“It must be so. The king’s commissioners have declared it…so that it shall henceforth be uninhabitable to its former occupants.”
I heard the sneer in his voice, but the cry of a hawk caught my attention, and I shielded my eyes with my hand to watch. For a long time it winged in effortless, illimitable circles, always searching. “You make no sound,” I told the bird. Thomas twisted his head to observe the soaring blade of wings. “You are Death,” I whispered. “Death makes no sound as he swoops down upon his hapless prey. Soundless talons grasp and rip, tearing the creature from the safety of earth.” Its shadow passed over me and I shivered before turning to Thomas. The dark, bearded chin raised upward, and the stubble on his throat rose as he swallowed. “Are you Death, Thomas? Have you come to rip us free of our safe place?”
“I am offering you an opportunity to preserve what you have.”
“What I have is in God’s hands, not yours!” My raw fingers covered my mouth and helplessly I shook my head. “How can you know?”
He moved to stand beside me, reassuring with his mere presence. How splendid he looked! How splendid he always looked. Shoulders broad and flanked by the wide borders of a fur collar over an embroidered skirted jerkin. There was gold in a cumbersome chain on his chest, gold on each of his fingers, gold on a broach on his feathered hat.
I sighed, thinking of Blackladies. “I will miss it, this ramshackle bag of bones. They will not need to pull down the walls. They will fall of their own accord.” We chuckled. It felt good to hear the both of us, yet it was too soon replaced by the wearying eloquence of a frown. “Yes, I will miss it. But more than that. This life cultivated within these walls. How can that be duplicated? I cannot understand, Thomas, what drove our own countrymen to forsake their Church. Were these pagan idols that they thought it necessary to bring down the very walls? Do they still call themselves Christians, Thomas, who turn out those given to God, allowing a desecrated king to dictate what is ‘church’ and what is not?”
“Yes,” he said. “They have that self-righteous mantle about them, like a younger generation wagging a finger disrespectfully to their elders. They think we poor papists have been misguided fools. They see now the profit in having a king as pope.”
“Is it because we believe the bishop of Rome to be the one ambassador of Christ from that long line of apostles back to Saint Peter himself? Is it because we believe that the Holy Mother deserves her rightful place of veneration in our chapels, because she gave her very body to be used as the ark of God? Is it because we hold that our Lord meant for all the world to be under the one roof, a Catholic roof, Thomas? And now they tear the roof away.”
“But you must admit”—he faced me, a gold encrusted fist digging into his hip—“there was corruption and misdeeds. Yes, even in monasteries and convents. Some would say especially those places.”
“But why break the pot because the wine is bad? Find the corruption, and fix it.”
“Oh, they fixed it right enough,” he said, shaking his head so that the feathers swayed. “And replaced them with their own corruptions. Someday Cromwell and his minions will be found out—”
“Hush, Thomas!” My fingers covered his mouth and I felt his warm breath on my nails, the bristly mustache on my fingertips. Slowly I withdrew my hand and stuffed it with the other within my scapular. “I would not have you speak treason. Somehow, I feel the wilderness can hear you.”
“Thomas Giffard is no traitor. All the court knows it.”
“And they knew it of Thomas More as well.” Falling silent, we both listened to the churning wind as it rushed through the yellowed beech leaves, tangling each spindly branch. Suddenly, it cried out in such lonely tones that I was overwhelmed with incomprehensible grief. Long held in, I, too, cried out my despair, “How am I to bear it? I made a vow!”
He clutched for my hands and dragged them out of their nest, crushing them in his warm fingers. “And you keep them as dear as the day you made them, Isabella. I am testimony to that. I will stand before God Himself and declare your virtues.”
I used my arm to smite a rivulet on my cheek, for Thomas still held my hands. I pulled them free, tugged my veil about me one last time, and turned from the priory. “Thank you, Thomas. That is the dearest utterance you have ever made to me.”
“The dearest, eh?” He chuckled ruefully. “Very well. I mean it… Ah Isabella,” he said with a forlorn sigh. “If there was ever a time when a man felt he outlived his usefulness…”
This was not the Thomas Giffard I knew. His voice was almost as desolate as mine. “No, Thomas. Not you. There is more for you to do, I am certain. It is I who was cast out of the nest by the cuckoo. I had a home and now it is no more. Now you are lord of this…this manor, such as it is. At first I was angered at the news until I realized the reasons behind it.”
“The reasons?”
“Yes. Your father was to purchase it, was he not?”
He smiled. “Yes. You have found me out. He had his plans… And I have mine.”
“Will you…will you live here, Thomas?”
He turned to me with as solemn an expression as Thomas Giffard was ever capable. “I will.”
It was not for me to divine his motives, but I was pleased that he would be its caretaker. It would no longer be the Blackladies we knew, and yet it might retain a flavor of what it was under Thomas’ stewardship. The foundations were set with blessings
, after all.
“Do you…” He cleared his throat and began anew. “Isabella. You need not go to your sister’s home to live. I have been thinking on this. The Giffard estates are many. Even my father…that is, we have agreed that you…that any one of your sisters are welcomed to reside there. You need not work as hard as you have. You can still devote your time to prayer and such like.”
He could not bear to let me go. Poor Thomas. If I possessed one whit less of strength, I would have flung myself into his arms and taken the sympathy he was prepared to mete out. Praise God I was strong enough to resist such an urge. For there was little doubt I loved Thomas with all the heart of a woman. But there was also little doubt in my mind—for it was the saving grace of my life—that I loved God more.
“It…is a generous offer, Thomas. But I cannot make use of such a thing. So much rumor abounds about us as it is. It would not be well for either of us.”
“Can I not do this one thing for you, beloved?”
Biting my lip, I turned, the veil shielding me from him. “You have not called me that for over twenty years.”
“Yet each day I thought it. You are still my beloved, my Isabella. But I have also never forgotten that you are Prioress. I make this offer to you with all courtesy, Madam. As much as it may appear, there are no motives behind it.”
“Still, I cannot accept. Though Alice may be pleased to make a home on one of your estates. She and her mother are always at odds. Will you do me this favor and take Alice? At least for a little while.”
“Anything, Prioress,” he said.
We grew silent. We both gazed at Blackladies, its moss-stained lime, its louse-eaten timbers, its stern eyes now dark. We looked with glazed and lovelorn eyes. “Do you think someday this madness will be lifted from England and this house may be restored to its more useful purpose, Thomas? Might that happen?”
“If it does, you may be certain, Madam, that I shall happily return it to its original state. Well…perhaps without the leaky roof.”
“Then I can be satisfied.” Yet even as I uttered it, the uncertainty of my present existence weighed heavily. I clutched the scapular, the very same my predecessor wore and the prioress before her. How many grave ladies have worn this armor of black before me, and how many more were destined for its future on English soil? I would not don the plain woolens and headdress Legh and Cavendish brought for us to wear. That was for later. I would leave Blackladies as a nun.
“Shall I collect Dame Alice, then, if she is willing?” he said.
I nodded, still gazing at Blackladies, her timbers and stone. “It was kind of you to offer to come for us, Thomas. I shall await my brother-in-law.”
He stopped and gazed at me. I did not deign to look, for I knew his expression was not fitting to our situation. But I did see him solemnly bow, as any courtier would to a great lady.
“Madam,” he said softly, and slowly withdrew.
THOMAS GIFFARD
MARCH, 1540
Swynnerton
XXX
Nay, tempt me not to love again: There was a time when love was sweet;
Dear Nea! had I known thee then, Our souls had not been slow to meet!
But oh! this weary heart hath run so many a time the rounds of pain,
Not even for thee, thou lovely one! Would I endure such pangs again.
—Thomas More
The bundle lay tight against my chest as I made the long walk to the entrance. A porter ran out to meet me and I belatedly realized that it was the master of the house, William Beche.
“My Lord Giffard. You honor us. Let me help you.” He offered to take the bundle, but I wanted to present it myself to Isabella, for I longed to see her and how she fared in her new life.
“Is the Prioress…I mean, is Isabella at home?”
His brows rose over his ruddy forehead. “She is ever here, my lord. She never leaves the grounds. Not even to go to market. It is most unnatural.”
“She is used to walls.”
“Yes, but she is not locked up here, my lord. Here she has the freedom of the grange to do as she likes. No one hinders her. Yet she will not go beyond the garden and fields.”
“Will you take me to her?”
“Surely I can offer you our hospitality first, my lord. In the parlor. My wife will fetch her for you.”
“No, thank you. You need not fetch her. I will go to her.” As I have ever done, I thought.
Shaking his head, he nevertheless took me through a gate and into the grounds. Agnes, his frowzy wife and Isabella’s sister, accosted us. I remember her in her younger days as a slight creature with a roving eye, but now she was plump and red-cheeked, the folds at her eyes scratched with lines. “My lord,” she said with a curtsey before shooting her husband a warning glare. “I did not know you had arrived.”
“Madam,” I said with a nod.
“You must take refreshment, Lord Giffard. Let me call a servant—”
“There is no need, madam. I do not wish to inconvenience you. I only brought this for your sister.”
I proffered the bundle in its sack. Spindly, claw-like, it was one of the rose bushes salvaged from Blackladies. The gardener dug it up for me and packaged it. I assumed Isabella would know what to do with it. “It is a rose bush,” I said to her.
“Oh, my lord, she does not tend the garden anymore.”
“Oh? I am most distressed to hear that. She took particular fondness in tending the gardens at Blackladies and at home in Beech.”
“Yes. It was her favorite occupation. And yet here she does not even ask to do it, and as you can see, Lord Giffard, it can use her touch.”
Around us were the drooping attempts to coax spring from the fledgling garden. Weeds crept into beds, and a birdbath was muddy and soiled with droppings and feathers. “Perhaps this will bring her comfort and she will start anew.”
“Let us hope so. Oh. There she is.”
I raised my head and saw a stately lady all in black, walking slowly and aimlessly in the field beyond the garden. Her head was down and the headdress’ veil blew out behind her. Not quite as I remembered her. She looked more drawn and more fragile in her commoner’s clothes. Strange how I could not recall her wearing anything other than a habit.
“She does not wear her nun’s clothes,” I remarked more to myself than to them.
“Yes. She would if allowed,” said Agnes. “Faith, my lord, it does not signify. Why she persists in this melancholy display—”
“Custom, madam. She was a nun a long time. She hopes to be so again.”
Agnes drew silent, and her husband beside her seemed uncomfortable in his own quietude. Finally, he asked, “How is our Alice, my lord? We have not heard from her for a month now.”
“Dame Alice is well…”
“Just ‘Alice’, my lord,” Agnes interrupted. “Only a daughter now.”
I smiled ruefully. “She will always be Dame Alice to me. She is happy in her retirement. She enjoys my children as a governess.”
“Certainly you might wish to have Isabella serve in your household as well, Lord Giffard?”
I glared at her. “What is the matter, madam? Is not her pension enough to keep her under your roof?”
“She isn’t happy here, my lord. I meant no offense.”
“She will not come,” I said, tight-lipped. “There is no need to ask again. She will stay here.”
“Then let me call her, my lord, and tell her you are here.”
At that moment, it did not seem wise, this visit. To look into her forlorn eyes and be able to do nothing was a heartache I could not bear. Her solitary figure moved more like a spirit along the greening fields, the mist becoming part of her like some pagan image from an old fable. But missing the opportunity to speak with her would be a greater heartache, and so I nodded to her sister as she went to fetch Isabella’s shade.
She looked up toward me as her sister spoke to her, and I moved slowly across the windswept field to meet her halfway. Agnes dep
arted as I approached.
I planted a smile upon my face, though Isabella did not return the expression.
“Thomas,” she said softly, vaguely. She looked at me almost without recognition, and then turned again to the surrounding vista as if looking for something.
“Isabella, I am glad to see you. It has been many months.”
“Has it? I am uncertain these days of the passage of time.”
“Perhaps you would be more aware if you returned to your garden. I understand you no longer toil there. Why?”
“It is full of such life and living things. I do not feel I belong there anymore.”
“Among the living? But you are alive, my dear. And you have such skill in this. Look. See what I have brought you.”
Slowly, she turned her eyes to the bundle, and she smiled at last. “Is it a rose bush?”
“Yes. From Blackladies.”
The mention of the word made her frown and she turned away from it, pulling her headdress’ veil around her as she was wont to do with her habit’s veil. “Take it away. It does not belong to me.”
I took her arm, grasping harder than I meant to do. “It is yours. I am giving it to you. And I want you to cultivate it and care for it as you have done for so many years. Do you care nothing for my gifts?”
She turned and gazed at it, reaching a hand out to touch its gnarled trunk. “You…salvaged it?”
“For you, lady.”
She raised her eyes and looked at me fondly, shaking her head. “Do you love me still, Thomas? Look how old we are. I am fifty-two, long past that first summer. Surely I am no longer lovable.”
I softened my hold on her arm, caressing with my thumb. At fifty-two she was at last a handsome woman. Still slim and tall, the years filled in the face that was long and boyish. Her eyes, always kind and somewhat mischievous, were still the same as I remembered. “Always lovable,” I said. “No matter how wrinkled and gray we become. I feel as if we are an old married couple. We seem to know each other’s moods so well. We know what the other is thinking, even when many miles separate us.”
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