“It was Sir George’s order, my lady,” the maid said respectfully.
Then Lady Margot arrived at the door of the solar. “Here you are,” she cried gaily, her smile lighting her lovely face. “Shall we retire to your bedchamber for the fitting?”
So, George wanted her to emulate Lady Margot, Aileas thought as she regarded the woman. Lady Margot of the delicate, graceful gestures and movements. She of the soft speech and dewy eye. George wanted his wife, whom he obviously found so lacking, to become like this prettily attired, pliant creature.
“I don’t want a fitting!” Aileas said, rising slowly and crossing her arms defiantly. She had the sudden feeling she was the victim of a conspiracy.
“Sir Richard, Herbert, would you excuse us, please?” Lady Margot asked calmly. The men nodded and left at once. “Elma, show the dressmaker to my lady’s bedchamber.”
Elma curtsied again and departed with alacrity, while Lady Margot glided into the room. “I’m sorry if this request disturbs you, Aileas,” she said kindly. “But it is your husband’s order that you be fitted for new gowns, as many as you would like.”
Aileas scowled darkly, and Margot suppressed a sigh. Although Margot had no true knowledge of what had happened between her cousin and his wife, it did not take a seer to understand that there was trouble between the newlyweds.
She reminded herself not to be swift to cast blame. After all, it was quite different being a wife to a man instead of a cousin, and she was not blind to George’s few faults. He had a singular inability to talk about serious matters, and one rarely knew exactly what he thought about anything. That he had a serious side she didn’t doubt, even if she had never seen it. She had always rather envied his future wife, for surely he would reveal his innermost thoughts to her, and Margot was quite certain that would be fascinating.
She had never imagined he would choose such a headstrong, unusual woman for his bride. Nor had she ever dreamed he would want her to act as peacemaker, for he had always assumed that role in any family dispute when she was a child. To be sure, he had been somewhat older, but he seemed to have a patient, imperturbable temper even then.
“I told my husband,” Aileas growled slowly and deliberately, “that I don’t want any new gowns.”
Margot began rolling up the loose parchments so that she wasn’t looking at Aileas. “I’m afraid you don’t have much choice, my dear,” she said quietly, “unless you would care to go naked.”
“What are you saying?”
“George ordered your old clothes burned.”
Aileas’s hands slapped down hard on the table and she glared at MargoL “Burned?”
Margot met her gaze steadfastly. “Burned.”
“Why?”
“Whatever reason he gave Elma when he ordered her to do it, I think you know the true explanation.”
Aileas straightened abruptly. “So he will try to make his ignorant brute of a wife into a lady, with your help,” she said scornfully. “How kind of him!”
It was all Margot could do not to shout at Aileas that she was acting like a spoiled child. Didn’t she see how much George cared for her?
Then, she happened to get a brief glimpse into Aileas’s eyes.
George was not the only one in pain, it seemed, and she should remember that it took two to make a quarrel. “Would you rather he denounce you?” she asked softly. “Or annul the marriage and send you home?”
“He wouldn’t dare!”
Margot doubted that he would, but she remained silent—and tried not to hope.
“I won’t allow him to blame me if he is unhappy in his choice. I am what I was when he chose me—the fault lies with him if he now has regrets.”
Margot took a deep breath and went forward. “Aileas, I think I should make something very clear right now. George thinks of me as a sister, not a lover.”
“So he said.”
“You should believe it.”
“You are so ugly and ill-tempered, then?” Aileas asked mockingly.
Margot remembered that she was here to help. “No. If George had ever wanted me, he could have asked for me long ago, before I married. He never did.”
“Perhaps because he was not ready to marry.”
“I have been widowed for more than five years, Aileas. He could have asked for me at any time.”
“And you would have taken him,” she retorted. “You are a great comfort to me, my lady!”
“No,” she lied. “I would not.” Then she spoke the truth, burying deep her pain. “He has never, ever looked at me the way he looked at you when I first arrived.”
“And how was that?” Aileas demanded defiantly. “With shock, because I do not dress the way he expects? With condescending pity? With assurance that he can improve this flawed female?”
“Can you not see for yourself how much he cares for you?” Margot demanded, trying very hard to keep her tone level. “If you are ignorant, Aileas, that is the ignorance that I truly pity you for.”
“I don’t want your pity!”
“No, but you shall have it nonetheless.” Margot forced away any thought of herself. This was the woman George had chosen. “If you are so blind that you cannot see how he wants you, then I shall pity you. If you are so stubborn that you would not change for such a man’s love, then I shall pity you more. If you throw away what he offers you, then you are the most pitiable creature on this earth!”
“I do not have to be upbraided,” Aileas began, marching past Margot, who grabbed her arm with surprising and unexpected strength.
“Yes, you do! Aileas, don’t be a fool! I want to help you, not take your place!”
Aileas regarded her steadily for a long moment, her expression inscrutable. “Very well, if you are so determined,” she said at last, “and because my lord orders it, I will learn. But know you this, my lady—in some things I will not be taught.”
With her back straight as a newly made lance and her chin jutting slightly forward, Aileas threw herself into a chair. “What do we do first, my lady,” she sneered haughtily, “after my wardrobe is made acceptable? Dancing lessons?”
“George was not specific.”
Aileas sniffed disdainfully. “That does not surprise me. He doesn’t like to give specific orders, does he?”
Bringing this couple together was not going to be easy, Margot thought with dismay. Nevertheless, she knew that something must be done, because they were breaking each other’s hearts. “George has probably angered you several times already,” she noted dispas-sionately. “He can be very high-handed.”
Aileas had not expected George’s cousin to criticize him at all. “Nor is he the perfect lord,” she said. “He leaves too much to his stewards, trustworthy though he thinks them. He doesn’t oversee his men well enough, either. To be sure, his manners cannot be faulted and he dresses as well as any man I have ever seen, but those things are not important. Not really.”
“What do you consider important?”
“Respect,” Aileas replied without hesitation.
“You do not think George commands the respect of his men?”
Aileas thought of George in her father’s hall and his own. “I suppose he does,” she admitted.
“George simply doesn’t understand the comfort of your old clothes,” Lady Margot said sympathetically. “He has never had to do dance while too tightly laced.”
“Or ride astride without breeches,” Aileas suggested.
Lady Margot laughed. “No, I’m sure he hasn’t. Unfortunately, George is not the most imaginative of men, I fear.”
Aileas recalled some of the intimacies she had enjoyed with her husband and thought that wasn’t quite accurate; nevertheless, she wasn’t about to relate any specifics to Lady Margot.
“Like most men, he simply doesn’t see a woman’s point of view. Very few of them even try.”
“They should,” Aileas muttered.
“Oh, I absolutely agree,” Margot hastened to reply. “But I believe
that would require a miracle. We women, on the other hand, are constantly forced to consider theirs.”
“I don’t,” Aileas said sulkily.
“That, if I may say so, is the problem.”
Aileas glared at her husband’s cousin. “Why should I consider a man’s point of view if he will not consider mine?”
Margot’s alabaster brow furrowed delicately. “Why should you be any different from the majority of women?”
Aileas barked a harsh laugh. “I am different from other women. Surely you have noticed. That is why George wants you to stay. To force me to change.”
“Oh, I don’t think—”
“I do! And you can tell my husband for me that I will not change, unless it suits me!” She rose from her chair, determined to leave at once.
“And you do not think it will suit you?” Lady Margot asked very, very softly.
Aileas stared at her, this woman who was everything she was not.
If she wanted to change... She did not. Yet if she didn’t, she would lose any hope of making George love her as she—
She drew in her breath sharply, the truth of her realization striking her like a blow. Was that what she felt for him? Love?
If it was, she loved him not as she loved Rufus, as a friend and confidant, and an extension of the life and home she had known.
Perhaps the emotion she was experiencing was what a wife should feel for her husband, as lover, confidant and companion, a partner in a new life and a new home, one they made together.
If she did not change, she would lose him and that feeling: That love. Indeed, it would be like surrendering without even a battle.
“Let us go to meet the dressmaker,” Aileas declared in ringing tones, as if the words were a call to arms, before striding from the room.
Margot sighed as she followed her cousin’s wife, although whether with relief or resignation, it would have been hard to say.
Richard grabbed Herbert’s arm and pulled him into the empty buttery. “This is too marvelous,” he whispered with a subdued chortle. “We are lucky men!”
“Why?” Herbert demanded peevishly. “I thought she was never going to understand. What did you mean by complimenting her comprehension? I was certain she was completely confused half the time.”
“Absolutely! She was! And didn’t you notice how she had to have every item pointed out to her?”
“Yes. What of it?”
“And that she sat there with puzzled brow over the most simple of things?”
“What does that signify?” Herbert asked. “I want to get some food, not answer riddles.”
“You fool,” his brother replied, not totally in jest, “she cannot read! I doubt whether she can add or subtract, either.”
“Of course she can. She’s a lord’s daughter.”
“She’s Sir Thomas’s daughter. I can believe he wouldn’t consider it worth the time or expense to have his only daughter taught to read.”
“But all noblewomen should have some learning,” Herbert protested, for he truly believed that his brother had to be wrong.
“And I tell you, she can’t. Didn’t you see where I pointed when we were discussing the flour, there at the end? My finger was at the notation for wine.”
“I wondered what you were doing.”
“She didn’t say anything. Don’t you think she would have?”
Herbert slowly let out his breath. “She would! You may be right.”
“Of course I am. That would explain why she didn’t want to have anything to do with you right from the start. I tell you, she’s the most ignorant noblewoman we’ve ever met!”
“Do you suppose Sir George knows?”
“No, or he would have said something about it, made some little joke. Or helped her. She is too proud, I suppose, to tell her husband.”
“That could well be.” Herbert agreed, more conspicuously excited. “Why, she will believe whatever we tell her about the list of supplies.”
His brother rubbed his hands together gleefully. “A lazy, lustful husband, an ignorant wife who cannot keep accounts—this is nearly too good to be true.”
The moment George saw Margot coming into the hall before the evening meal, he knew something was wrong. “Well?” he asked when she sat at the high table. “What happened? And where is Aileas?”
“She complains her head is aching, so she will not come to eat.”
No doubt she would not be welcoming in their bed tonight, which was probably just as well. “Did she send the dressmaker away?”
“Not before the appropriate measurements were taken and the fabric selected.”
George let out his breath slowly. “I was afraid she’d shove the poor creature down the stairs.”
“She wasn’t happy about it,” Margot admitted. “I have never seen a grown woman fidget so much.”
Their conversation paused while Father Adolphus pronounced grace and the first course arrived. During the second, third and fourth, they spoke of old acquaintances, although George found it difficult to concentrate.
“That disgruntled expression would do credit to your wife,” Margot observed quietly. “She can scowl as no woman I have ever met. She was very angry and frustrated with you, you know.”
“I know,” George remarked, inwardly calm but secretly filled with anxiety. He would have very much liked to have been a witness to the conversation between Margot and Aileas, yet he was too proud to seem overly curious, just as he was too proud to confront Aileas about her “special” knowledge. He pushed away that thought as he took a bite of pheasant cooked in sauce.
“That’s a good sign, George.”
He couldn’t quite mask his surprise. “It is?”
“Any strong feeling is cause for hope. If she were indifferent to you, then I would be truly alarmed. Does she enjoy making love with you?”
“Margot!”
“George, if you want my help, I cannot be stumbling around in the dark. I’ve never known a woman quite like your wife, and I don’t want to make things worse between you.”
“And that gives you the right to pry into the most intimate details of our life?”
“If you would rather not have my help, you have only to say so.”
George regarded his cousin’s placid face, subduing the urge to tell her what he feared about his wife’s honor, or lack of it. “As far as I can tell, she enjoys our intimacy immensely.”
Margot smiled happily. “Excellent! Oh, that is wonderful!”
“I cannot disagree,” he replied, while secretly wondering how often Aileas had enjoyed such... activities...and if there had been many men. Or only one with bright red hair.
“Nevertheless, George,” Margot warned, “you cannot build a happy life based only upon what happens in the nuptial bed. There is the rest of the day to consider, too.”
“I tried to get her to stay in bed during the day, but she has the foolish notion that no good lord or lady remains in bed past daybreak.”
“No wonder she is angry with you, if this is the cavalier way you talk of the troubles between you.”
“What would you have me do?” George countered.
“Treat her with patience.”
“I have!” George protested with a smile.
“Not enough, I think. You can’t expect her to change overnight—assuming, of course, that you do want her to change, for clearly, she is willing to try.”
“What are you suggesting? That I want a wife who eats like the least mannered of my soldiers? Who dresses like some sort of cross between a squire and a serving wench? Who would rather shoot arrows than dance?”
Margot eyed him shrewdly. “I must ask you this, George. If she does change to suit you, will you love her as much?”
George regarded her steadily, his expression frustratingly impenetrable. “You believe that I love her?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Her current manner of behavior is simply too embarrassing to be endured,” he said after a momen
t.
Margot wondered if he truly saw the danger in what he was attempting, and if she should try to warn him that some marriages would break from the strain of unmet expectations. She knew that from bitter experience, for she had not borne her husband the son he craved. He had cursed her for her barrenness every day after their first year together, including the day he died. “I will try to teach her, George. But you must forbear and leave it to me.”
“I shall be the very paragon of a patient husband,” George promised. “That will not be so very hard a task.”
Margot was not nearly so sure.
Chapter Fourteen
Aileas sat on the stone floor of her bedchamber, her back against the wall, her legs tucked beneath her, thinking. Here at Ravensloft, she had no tree to climb, so she had cautiously and secretively returned to the bedchamber after Elma had finished tidying it.
She was also hiding, for it was time to go through the accounts with Herbert again.
She didn’t want to be near anyone, not even Elma, tempting as it was to confide in someone. Her father had always made it clear that servants were the last people to trust with your state of mind, and although Elma seemed keen to listen, Aileas could not bring herself to break her father’s rule, even here.
There was Lady Margot, but Aileas would not voice her fears and doubts to that lady, no matter how kindhearted she seemed. Indeed, she found it difficult to be with her husband’s perfect cousin, for she felt as if all her faults were magnified in Lady Margot’s presence.
So she would be alone with her thoughts, and today, only for today, she would abandon her duty and avoid the strain of being with Herbert.
When she was in the solar with him, she was always trying to determine if her growing suspicions were correct. Every day he showed her the record of purchases of food, drink and other items for the household, with the most recent added to the bottom of the list. Several times now, she could swear that things that had been listed the day before were altered or missing, or that the notation had been changed somehow, one word replaced with another, the figures slightly different.
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