‘I should like to go home now, if you please,’ I said.
‘Home to Middlecote?’ He cocked a brow. ‘Or home to Will?’
Truth was I was so angry with Will for leaving me that I did not wish to be anywhere near him but I did not have much choice.
‘Back to Middlecote,’ I said. ‘Nowhere is home to me.’
‘Do you mind that?’ He was standing watching me and although he was not within touching distance it felt as though he were very close indeed.
‘No one has asked me that before,’ I said slowly.
‘I’m asking now.’
‘Yes,’ I said. I had never been so honest before, with myself or with anyone else. ‘I am accustomed to being rootless,’ I said, ‘but that does not mean I like it. What about you?’
‘This is my home,’ he said. He gestured towards the fallen walls and broken beams of the house behind us. ‘One day, when I may, I will rebuild Kingston Parva. My mother’s kin, the De Morvens, lived here. I may never regain Middlecote but this I can do.’
‘Your mother was descended from the De Morvens?’ I was impressed. ‘I heard they were noble.’
‘Sir Reginald De Morven was the greatest knight of his time,’ Thomas said simply.
‘Until he went mad,’ I said. Eleanor had told me about the De Morven knights once when we had taken the carriage past Kingston Parva to visit Lady Fenner’s relatives in Ashbury.
‘He was not mad,’ Thomas said. He fixed me with his cool, dark gaze. ‘Sir Reginald saw visions of the future. He was like you, Mary Seymour, only different. He passed through time.’
A shiver brushed over my skin. How foolish that I, with my visions and my secret friend, would feel superstitious to hear such words. Yet I had never met anyone else with gifts mysterious like mine. I had never known Darrell as a real person. For all I knew, he could be no more than a figment of my imagination, which was almost how he felt now that I had cut him out of my life and not spoken to him for so long.
‘Cat. Catherine…’ Again it came, that echo. Again I ignored it and concentrated on Thomas.
‘Truly?’ I looked at him suspiciously. ‘Or do you tease me?’
‘On my honour,’ he said, ‘such as it is. Reginald De Morven visited the future and it was that that drove him insane.’
It did not sound to me that the future had a great deal to offer if that was the case. ‘How do you know?’ I demanded. ‘How do you know that was what happened to him?’
I saw a shadow cloud his eyes then, secretive and dark. ‘I know,’ he said, just as he had done earlier, and somehow I believed him now as I had then.
‘Come on,’ he added impatiently, as though I was keeping him waiting. ‘If we are to return you to Middlecote, we must be gone.’ And he strode away across the paddock to fetch the long-suffering horse before I could reply.
Dawn was breaking as we crossed the river by Middlecote. I half expected to see the house awake, the lights burning and men out searching for me, but it was silent and shuttered. Thomas jumped down from the saddle and held out a hand to help me down. This time he did not let me go.
For a moment we did not speak. He was very close to me, so close I could smell the leather and the cold night air on him. Then he leaned down and touched my cheek lightly with his gloved fingers.
‘Goodbye, then, Mary Seymour,’ he said. He kissed me, very gently, but I felt it deep in my bones. When I opened my eyes, I saw he was smiling at me.
‘I wish you good luck, Thomas Fenner,’ I said. ‘I think you will need it.’
He laughed. ‘A man makes his own luck,’ he said. The smile died from his eyes. ‘We’ll meet again. Soon.’
I watched him ride away and after he had gone I stood there until the cool night breeze reminded me that it was still early and I was cold.
The door of Middlecote stood open. Will pounced on me as soon as I was inside, pulling me into the parlour, shutting the door so that we were trapped in the dark. I was taken by surprise, my head still full of Thomas, my body still singing from his touch. I could just see Will’s face in the dying light of the fire. He had been drinking. The room was so full of heat and alcohol fumes that my head spun.
‘What did you tell him?’ His hands gripped my shoulders like claws. His face was so close to mine I could smell the brandy on his breath. He sounded angry, his handsome face contorted by drunkenness and fear.
‘Who?’ I shook him off. I was furious with him. For the first time I almost despised him. He had abandoned me and returned here to the comfort of his wine bottle.
‘Don’t toy with me, Mary.’ There was a quality of violence, barely suppressed, about him that sent ripples of fear over my skin. I knew the brutality Will was capable of inflicting. I edged around until my back was to the door.
‘You were with Thomas tonight.’ He slopped more wine into his glass and a good deal of it over the desk. An empty flagon already lay by the grate.
‘I was not with anyone,’ I flashed back at him. It would have been politic to hold my tongue but I had had enough. ‘You left me. Your half-brother brought me back. I cannot be held responsible for that.’
‘What did you tell him?’ he repeated. His voice had risen slightly. Violence rippled along the edge of it. ‘God damn it, what did you say about me?’
‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘I don’t know what you mean. What should I tell him?’
He came towards me and I backed up against the door, feeling for the latch, my heart missing a beat as my anxious fingers searched in vain.
‘He wants to ruin me.’ Will was crowding me now, pressing me against the wooden frame, his body hard against mine. I had the impression though that I was of little importance; his anger and aggression were focused elsewhere, beyond me and that hot little room where the air buzzed with hatred.
‘You can do that yourself without Thomas lifting a finger,’ I said. ‘You are halfway there already.’
His gaze focused on me. Astonishingly, he laughed. ‘Wise little Mary,’ he said. ‘All I need is for Thomas to deal the final blow.’ Suddenly the tension left him. His body slumped against me, his head lolling on my shoulder.
‘Ah, Mary,’ he said. ‘You are so sweet and so honest. I should wed you. I really should, even though you have no money.’
‘You’re drunk,’ I said, pushing him gently away, half exasperated, half afraid he would fall. ‘I’ll not hold you to it.’
‘Hold me to it. Please.’ His grip was tight, his eyes urgent, the change in him as fickle and sudden as the veering wind. ‘I need you to save me.’
I stifled an insane desire to laugh. How recently Will professing his need for me would have had me swooning. Yet it seemed like years ago now, and I a green girl who had known no better. I felt cold and disillusioned and so very stupid.
‘Will,’ I said, ‘go to bed.’
He slumped into the fireside chair. ‘Aye,’ he mumbled, the spittle dribbling from the side of his mouth. ‘Sleep.’
He was already snoring when I slipped out of the door.
I did not expect to be able to sleep myself, but, as the light started to strengthen, I fell into a doze, and dreamed of Thomas Fenner. In my dream he was not as I had seen him that night, but was dressed as those soldiers had been long ago when I had seen them in Savernake Forest, in a buff-coloured coat with a red sash. He was part of a small band of mounted troops fighting a bitter skirmish before my very eyes. I watched the engagement through my dream: Thomas proved a skilful swordsman, elegant and economical in his movements, and it would have been a pleasure to watch him had the fight not been so brutal and bloody. In the end he and his men won out, and, as they rode away, he turned back towards me. In the background I could see Middlecote Hall and before it Thomas, sword in his hand and blood on the sword.
‘Men will always fight,’ he said, speaking directly to me through the dream. ‘Remember that, Mary. Will and I are kin but we will always try to take from the other the one thing that counts the most.’
<
br /> Chapter 20
Alison woke to find that Adam had gone. The room was light and the sheets were chilled. She supposed it saved her the trouble of wondering what would happen next. She had never had a one-night stand before and it felt strange to realise that she had no idea of how to handle the morning after. Then she heard the sound of a key in the lock and Adam’s tread on the stairs.
‘I borrowed your keys,’ he said. ‘I hope that’s okay.’ He had a bag of croissants in one hand and a tray with two coffees on it in the other. He put them down on the chest of drawers and came over to kiss her. His face was cold. He smelled deliciously of fresh air but the kiss was warm and confident, and Alison felt her stomach drop. It felt secure and weirdly good. It was almost as though they had been together for ten years rather than apart. She stifled a giggle.
‘What’s funny?’ There was wariness in Adam’s eyes even if he was smiling. He was not as sure of her as he had seemed. That made her feel a bit better. Everything had seemed to be moving far too quickly.
‘Nothing,’ Alison said. She smiled too, pushing the hair away from her face. ‘That was nice of you. The coffee smells great.’
Adam seemed to have lost interest in the coffee. He kissed her again, more slowly this time, very sweet and hot. His hand came up to tangle in her hair.
‘You’re so beautiful, Ali,’ he said, against her mouth. ‘You do know that, don’t you?’
Alison broke away from him. ‘It was the only thing about me that was valued when I was growing up,’ she said.
‘Sorry,’ Adam said slowly. He sat down next to her on the bed. ‘I’m sorry if it upsets you. But it is a fact.’
The chill within Alison eased slightly. ‘No, I’m sorry,’ she said. She touched his cheek, the stubble rough against her fingers. ‘Thank you,’ she whispered. Inside, she was feeling warm and it was lovely, a lambent sweetness that filled her head and her heart. She could not let herself think about it too much because she knew if she did she would want to pull back from the brink of intimacy. She shut the thought out. There would be plenty of time to think later.
Adam was running the strands of her hair through his fingers. ‘I think that was what scuppered me at Middlecote,’ he said ruefully. ‘I was so annoyed that I had found some evidence to support your theory about Mary Seymour living there that I felt I had to go down and revisit the place. And there you were, having tramped across the fields in your city clothes, and you still looked gorgeous and then you took off your hat and shook out your hair and I wanted to take you straight inside and—’
Alison pressed her fingers to his lips, then turned his face to hers and kissed him. ‘Show me,’ she whispered, lying back, pulling him down with her into the tangle of bedclothes.
The coffee went cold so they brewed some fresh in the cafetière.
*
‘You’re looking very well,’ Diana said.
It was a chill day. The water rushed down the stream at the end of Diana’s garden. The bare twigs and branches looked even more desolate than they had done two weeks before. So did Diana; she seemed to have diminished since Alison had last seen her, skin translucent and paper-thin, her whole body seemingly brittle.
‘I’m so sorry to trouble you,’ Alison said. She felt very awkward. Diana was the only person who knew the truth, the only person she could talk to, but it felt like imposing on her when she was so sick.
Diana smiled and beckoned her inside. ‘It’s no trouble. So many people keep away when someone is dying. It’s nice to have a visitor.’
The interior of the cottage was very bright and cheerful. Hector the cat was curled up on a cushion in one of the armchairs. He raised his head, gave Alison a long, thoughtful stare from his glassy green eyes, then went back to sleep.
‘Tea?’ Diana asked.
‘I’ll make it,’ Alison said hastily.
‘There’s biscuits in the silver tin,’ Diana called after her. ‘Christmas ones.’
‘You said in your telephone call that there was something urgent you needed to discuss with me,’ Diana said, when they were settled with the tea and ginger biscuits shaped like fir trees. ‘What can I do to help?’
‘I need you to tell me I’m sane,’ Alison said.
Diana raised her brows. ‘Are you starting to doubt it?’
‘I don’t know,’ Alison said in a rush. ‘I don’t know anything any more.’
It was true, she thought. She felt helpless, buffeted by conflicting emotions and desires. For so long finding Arthur had been her guiding light. Now though there was so much more: Adam, her life in London, the promise of the future. She felt guilty and horribly conflicted.
Diana waited, brows raised, blue gaze steady and clear.
‘A few weeks ago I stumbled across a painting of Mary Seymour,’ Alison said. ‘There were some artefacts associated with it. I didn’t tell you last time I saw you, because…’ She stopped again. Diana waited again. She was a killer with silences as well as with questions.
‘Because it involved Adam,’ Alison said, in a rush, ‘and I didn’t want to open up all that again.’
‘I see,’ Diana said.
Alison thought Diana probably did see far too much. She had always challenged her to tell Adam the truth about herself and Alison had always resisted, seeing it as impossible.
‘Adam thought it was a portrait of Anne Boleyn,’ she said, trying to focus on the facts and blot out the conflicting emotions.
‘I read about it in the paper.’ Diana gestured towards a pile of newspapers and magazines stacked on the table beside her. ‘Everyone seems very excited at the discovery.’
‘So was Adam until I told him he’d got it wrong,’ Alison said gloomily. ‘Perhaps I should have kept quiet, except that I needed to find out where he had discovered it and what else he knew.’
‘In order to see whether Mary had left you any clues to Arthur’s whereabouts,’ Diana said. ‘I remember you telling me about the agreement the two of you had made.’ She sat forward. ‘But this is wonderful! Have you found anything useful?’
Alison studied the swirling pattern of colours on the rug, scuffing her boot over the thick pile, wondering why it did not feel as wonderful to her as it should.
‘I think so,’ she said. ‘There are some clues in Mary’s portrait and also in a wooden box.’ She looked up. ‘I know it all sounds quite ridiculous.’
‘Is this why you are questioning your sanity?’ Diana asked. She stirred her second cup of tea very precisely.
‘Yes,’ Alison said, looking up and meeting Diana’s perceptive blue gaze. ‘I can’t quite believe it, and I’m scared I’m imagining the whole thing because I want it so much. You know—that I’m so obsessed that I’m trying to force the facts to fit what I want them to be.’
‘And what are the facts?’ Diana enquired. She sipped her tea, her eyes, still very bright, watching Alison over the rim of her cup. ‘What have you found out?’
‘First there’s a box that belonged to me when I was a child,’ Alison said. She sat back in her chair, relaxing a little as she told Diana the story of the wooden box with her initials inlaid in the lid.
‘I left it behind when I ran away in Marlborough that day,’ she said. ‘There wasn’t much in it— a few pins, a ribbon… Mary must have taken it with her to Middlecote Hall and when she discovered news of Arthur she left clues in the box for me to find.’
‘Why would Mary make it so complicated?’ Diana asked. ‘Why not just leave you a letter?’
‘I’ve thought about that a lot,’ Alison admitted. ‘Mary didn’t know where I was or how to contact me.’ She swallowed painfully. ‘And I couldn’t get back to find her. Perhaps she thought a letter could get lost more easily, or be destroyed, or that it wasn’t very durable.’
‘Or perhaps she wanted it to be a secret,’ Diana said thoughtfully, ‘something that only you would understand. After all, you must have impressed upon her that yours was a confidential arrangement. No one was to know.’
‘Both of us were keeping secrets,’ Alison agreed.
Diana stretched out a thin hand and stroked Hector’s head very gently. The cat started to purr extremely loudly. ‘So what were the clues that you think Mary left in the box?’ she asked.
Alison opened her bag and took out the piece of paper Adam had given her with the list of items. She had added to it her notes on the images in Mary’s portrait.
‘First of all, the box was featured in Mary’s portrait,’ she said, ‘which could have been a coincidence or a deliberate inclusion. Then there were four little symbols in each corner of the picture.’ She checked the paper. ‘One was a wyvern, which I think is the symbol of Middlecote. There are carved wyverns on the gates. Then there was an angel. Adam says they are usually messengers.’
Diana nodded. ‘That seems plausible.’
‘The other two are more open to interpretation,’ Alison admitted. ‘One is a lion. It’s a symbol of fortitude and endurance—of waiting, if you like. And the fourth is a magic wand decorated with irises.’
‘The symbol of the goddess Circe raising the dead,’ Diana said, nodding. ‘That’s clever. Mary was trying to tell you to keep faith and that the answer to your quest was at Middlecote.’
Alison’s heart leaped. ‘That’s what I hoped,’ she said. Her hands shook a little as she picked the paper up again. ‘This was the stuff that was in the box,’ she said. ‘First, there was a coin dated 1560. That’s the year of Arthur’s birth. And a twig of rosemary—for remembrance, I thought. Mary wanted me to know she had not forgotten me.’ She stopped, a lump in her throat. It felt as though she could cry at almost anything these days. She found it very irritating.
‘I haven’t worked out the other clues yet,’ she said. ‘There was a button engraved with a bear. I thought it might be a play on the name Artorious—King Arthur?’
‘Or perhaps it’s from a family crest?’ Diana suggested. ‘This is like a cryptic crossword. Find the hidden meaning.’
‘Exactly,’ Alison said. She glanced at the list again. ‘There was also a plate from a falcon—’ she looked up ‘—like a ring on its leg, according to Adam. I’ve no idea about that. Then there is a knight from a chess set carved from holly, and a woollen thread in green tied to a piece of catgut.’
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