Geoffrey shrugged. “I hope it is nonsense, but I beg you to consider what this girl has already accomplished. She has sent out from this keep a complete troop of men-at-arms, fully armed and horsed, scot free. She has saved every one of her servants even one bruise—for doubtless some of our men would have been carried away by excitement and struck at the servants if they were about the keep when Adam entered. On top of that, she has made us all feel—I also, I freely admit—that we are brutes and monsters to threaten and frighten one poor, helpless, defenseless girl.”
“But you cannot fault her for wishing to save her servants hurt,” Adam said quickly.
“I cannot fault her for anything she has done,” Geoffrey replied impatiently. “If Lady Gilliane’s only desire is to protect herself and her servants, she has acted with great wisdom. I only ask you to consider how many women would dare meet a whole army all alone, without even a few women servants to be thrown to the invaders if needful? Such resolution argues a very strong spirit.”
Ian shook his head. “I do not believe it. That the girl has courage and wisdom is plain from her actions, but that she is a murderess and plans some betrayal…it was not in her face.”
Adam thought of Gilliane’s face and experienced a most peculiar sinking sensation. It was such a lovely face, heart-shaped and dominated by huge dark eyes framed in long, curling lashes. Could that tender mouth with its soft, rosy lips have spoken nothing but lies? Adam loved Ian deeply and had an enormous respect for his military abilities and perceptions, but he knew that Ian was not always the best judge of people. He was so soft of heart that he saw only the best in everyone. On the other hand, Geoffrey had the keenest mind Adam knew. He was almost never at fault in his estimation of character or purpose.
“Do you really believe Lady Gilliane murdered her husband?” Adam asked rather harshly.
Geoffrey frowned at him in a worried way. “To speak the truth, I find it most hard to believe that. If she were not a woman, I would say that eyes, voice, and manner spoke of a brave soul facing the inevitable with great courage and honesty.”
“There, you see,” Ian said with satisfaction.
“Wait,” Geoffrey interrupted. “Ian, think how often you have been cozened by Alinor into doing what you had no intention of doing. The ability to mask the truth is a woman’s best weapon. Remember that our good and Lady Gilliane’s good are not—to her mind, at least—the same.”
“Does that make her a murderess?” Adam asked.
“No! I am not really accusing the poor girl of anything. I am only trying to warn you that a sweet face, a soft voice and manner, do not really spell compliance or innocence in a woman. I only wish to say that she must be watched. For God’s sake, Adam, you have laughed at me often enough for being, as you say, enchained like a slave by Joanna’s thinnest hair. At least I know that Joanna and I have the same end purpose, even if we might go about achieving it in different ways. Do not permit yourself to be similarly enchained by a woman who seeks a different end from yours.”
“I have no intention of being enslaved by any woman,” Adam replied indignantly.
“One never does,” Ian remarked dryly. “Often one does not intend to love at all. Geoffrey is right there. Lady Gilliane is a very beautiful woman. I warned you not to take advantage of her helplessness. Be careful, also, that you do not permit her to use her helplessness as a weapon against you.”
As Ian spoke, they became aware that the keep was no longer empty and silent. Sounds from the stairwell indicated that servants were coming up to cross over to the stairs that would take them down and outside. Geoffrey started hurriedly to go out also and make sure that the waiting men-at-arms holding the walls and courtyards did not think this was the start of an attack. Ian and Adam saw him stop and exchange a few words with Gilliane, who then came across toward them. She was still holding the roll of parchment that had been in her hand when they came into the hall. This she offered to Adam. She was trembling again and looked little less frightened than when they first discovered her.
“I have yielded the keep,” she said rather breathlessly, “and you hold it now, but I am not sure that it was in my right to yield it.”
Adam smiled grimly. “It is a little late to think of that now. We are within, and, unless this is a far stranger place than any I have ever seen, or you have discovered how to make armed men invisible, you have no way to put us out.”
Gilliane looked at him, then dropped her eyes. “I have no desire to put you out,” she said softly.
Color stained Adam’s face. He lifted his hand, as if to touch her, but the roll of parchment she had given him frustrated that intention. There was a brief silence as Adam recognized what he had been about to do and reminded himself that perhaps Ian’s and Geoffrey’s warnings were not very wide of the mark.
“What is this you have given me?” he asked, avoiding any comment on what Gilliane had said.
“It is my marriage contract,” Gilliane replied, her distaste plain in her face and voice.
Of course it was not surprising that she had taken no pleasure in being the wife of a feeble-minded cripple, but Adam wished that her repugnance had not been tinged with hatred. He had heard from common friends that young Neville had been a pleasant, decent man before the wounds that reduced him to helplessness had been inflicted. To Adam, it seemed Neville was more deserving of pity than hate; however, for a woman faced with a whole life bound to such a wreck…
“There is no need to prove your right,” Ian remarked, interrupting Adam’s thought. “It is not a sensible thing to lie about because the truth would very soon come to light.”
“Not my marriage contract with poor Gilbert,” Gilliane said, her voice shaking and her eyes suddenly full of tears. She made an effort and steadied herself. “Saer never gave me or showed me that. Perhaps it is among the other documents. That which I gave you,” she choked and again there was hatred in her voice, “is the contract of my marriage with Osbert de Cercy.”
“You were not a widow long,” Ian said, and he looked cold and hard for the first time.
“No,” Gilliane agreed, very low, but then she looked up again—only her eyes sought Adam’s, not Ian’s. “But it was not by my will. I was forced. I hate Osbert de Cercy.”
A whole series of emotions of increasing intensity passed through Adam. First there had been a mild pleasure and relief when Gilliane spoke so gently of “poor Gilbert.” Then came shock and, for some reason Adam did not wish to consider, rage at the realization that Gilliane was not a widow. The rage was colored by an immense disgust when Ian’s remark made the situation all too clear. Gilliane’s last statement, that she was forced into her second marriage and hated her husband, brought an even more inexplicable burst of joy. That feeling was so strong that Adam recoiled from it. It should not matter to him whether Gilliane was married or not. He had taken Tarring to preserve the peace on his own lands and to forward the cause of King Henry, not to play games with a pretty girl.
“It makes no difference,” Adam said harshly. “We are here, and here we will stay. Possession,” he sneered, “is nine points out of ten in any court of law—and in these times, the man with the strongest arm is the law.”
Gilliane had heard the change in Ian’s voice, had seen the emotions flickering on Adam’s expressive face. An enormous bitterness flooded her. Without even being there, Osbert had again inflicted hurt. Gilliane was very clever at reading expressions and inflections. She knew what the men were thinking—Osbert had not lied about that. They were wondering whether she had done away with her useless hulk of a husband and grabbed the first male available to take his place. Or, even worse, whether Osbert had been her lover all along and they had waited only to be free of Saer so that they could murder Gilbert and make their union official. She did not care what the man called Ian thought, but the look on Adam’s face was unbearable.
“You need fight no point of law with me,” Gilliane said bitterly. “From what I was told, the lands
were yielded to Osbert in that contract anyway. As to your possession, Satan himself would be more welcome to me in this place than Osbert.”
It was a great sin, Gilliane knew, for a woman to criticize or show repugnance for the most monstrous of husbands. It was a woman’s place to marry whom she was told to marry and to accept any treatment meted out by the man to whom she had been given. Therefore, she expected the anger and disapproval on the faces of the men to deepen. Perhaps she had gone too far this time and would be beaten. It did not matter. Nothing mattered but the look of revulsion on the face of the man whose voice had been the foundation of all her dreams. Amazingly, however, his expression did not darken. If anything it cleared somewhat. The eyes were wary, but the sick disgust was gone.
To Adam, who had grown up in a household where a woman possessed and ruled her own lands, whose mother was violently tenacious of her right and her possessions, Gilliane had virtually proved the truth of her statement that her marriage was forced by her bitterness. Her remark about yielding the lands in the contract was, to Adam, clear evidence that Gilliane could not have been willing. Of course, the desire to possess the land did not exonerate her from suspicion of having murdered the man who originally owned it. If anything, the possessiveness rather increased the possibility that Gilliane was a murderess. However, for some reason, that did not trouble Adam much—not nearly so much as the idea that she had rushed from her husband’s bier into the arms of a waiting lover.
Instead of being relieved by the relaxation of suspicion she perceived, Gilliane was further distressed. These were men such as she had never met before. Though she was utterly in their power, they had neither threatened nor struck her. From their expressions, they even seemed to believe that she had not welcomed the marriage with Osbert. Now she must renew their distrust by seeming to threaten them. Clasping her hands nervously, she said, “I must tell you something more. You will be angry, but I cannot help it. When Osbert left here four days ago, he said he would go to Prince Louis and that the prince would come here or send a force to destroy you and take back the keep.”
Again the reaction she got was totally foreign to Gilliane’s experience. Adam burst out laughing. “God should so favor us,” he exclaimed, and when he was finished laughing, he looked hopefully at Ian.
Ian smiled also, but before he could speak, Gilliane heard the third man, the one called Geoffrey, approaching with his odd, uneven gait. “Geoffrey,” Ian called, beckoning, “Lady Gilliane tells us that Osbert de Cercy has gone to bring Louis down upon us.”
The keen golden eyes flashed to Gilliane. “How did he know we were coming?”
“Those who fled away from Saer’s army returned here. What they told him, I do not know. I was…” Gilliane hesitated. She was afraid to bring up Gilbert’s death. Whenever she mentioned it, the expressions of the men broadcast danger. “I was not myself for near a week. All I know is what I have told you.”
“And why have you told us?” Geoffrey asked pleasantly.
“It does not matter why Lady Gilliane has told us,” Adam put in impatiently. “What is important is whether or not it can be true.”
There was a silence while the men looked speculatively at Gilliane. The warning might merely be a device to frighten them away or it was intended to keep them in Tarring. The last was the likeliest reason, but the purpose behind Gilliane’s desire to have them stay was not so clear. It was possible that keeping them in Tarring would forward some purpose of Osbert’s or Louis’s elsewhere in the country. Their eyes moved from Gilliane to one another, but what they wanted to say could not be said in her presence.
“One thing I can assure you,” Geoffrey remarked, “is that there is no present danger to us in the keep. The only men acquainted with the use of arms are too few and too badly wounded to do anything.”
“And as for your question, Adam,” Ian added, “whether or not it is true that Louis will come, he will certainly not come today. So, since we are safe here, we might as well take our ease.” He turned and bowed to Gilliane. “I do not wish to be offensive, Lady Gilliane, but we are now resident in this keep. We would, of course, prefer that you regard us as guests. Might I ask you, then, for refreshment and to see that chambers are readied for us? We would enjoy your company, if you will be so good as to favor us with it. However, I do not wish you to feel that we demand your service. If our presence is offensive to you, you may withdraw to the women’s quarters.”
Color flooded up Gilliane’s throat and into her face. Her hand fluttered to her lips. “Oh, do pardon me,” she gasped, realized that although she had made arrangements for dinner, she had neglected every other duty of a hostess. “Indeed, I will see to your comforts at once. I am a little overset by what has happened today.”
“As well you might be,” Ian agreed kindly. “There is no blame to you, but the worst is over now, so let us see if we cannot come to a more ordinary way of life.”
Hardly able to believe her good fortune, Gilliane hurried away to give directions to the maids to strip and air Saer’s and Osbert’s beds and to set up again the one Sir Richard had used. Although she did not really expect that this pleasant situation would last, she was accustomed to snatching at brief joys and pushing future fears into the background. Perhaps the kindness with which she was being treated was only some type of pitfall. If it was, Gilliane did not wish to think about it. She had spoken and acted nothing but the truth in every matter except Gilbert’s death, so there was no trap into which she could fall. It was senseless to worry about problems completely beyond her knowledge and experience. For as long as circumstances permitted, Gilliane would be happy.
“Do you think she knew we wished to be rid of her?” Ian asked.
Adam could feel himself flushing with indignation on Gilliane’s behalf, and he bit his tongue to restrain a hot denial. Each time he spoke to her it seemed more certain to him that she was as guiltless and guileless as she was beautiful. The very strength of his feeling made him uneasy, so it was with considerable relief that he heard Geoffrey make the denial for him.
“I doubt Lady Gilliane has been treated with much subtlety by de Cercy—father or son.” Geoffrey’s expression became thoughtful. “In fact, I doubt she has been treated with much courtesy. It seems to me that it might be no hard thing to win her to our cause.”
“Win her?” Adam questioned. “You heard what she said about de Cercy—he forced her and she hates him. She must be ours already. It needs only—”
“Women—” Ian and Geoffrey began together. Both stopped and Ian went on alone, being the better authority on the subject. “Women believe that only the end of the matter they desire is of import. The means a woman will use to gain her ends would turn a man’s hair white. There is no honor in them, and right and wrong are what will best or least forward their purpose.”
“It is true, Adam,” Geoffrey emphasized. “You must remember it. Not that they are to be blamed for it,” Geoffrey added fairly. “What can a woman do? Can she challenge you to meet her body to body…”
Adam and Ian began to laugh. “That, yes,” Ian said, grinning. “It is a challenge few men can resist or come away from victorious.”
“Very well, you may laugh,” Geoffrey said defensively, “but that, too, is something to be guarded against. As you say, it is very hard to deny a woman what she asks at such a time.”
“You manage to do so,” Adam remarked, knowing that what Joanna wanted was for her husband not to ride to battle.
Geoffrey shook his head. “I wish I could take such credit, but I cannot. I can only thank God that Joanna loves me enough not to wring from me promises that would break my heart in the keeping.”
“That is the very point,” Ian urged. “Love is all to a woman. She will tear out her own heart, sacrifice her body, lie, see a whole country go up in flames, all to serve her love. If Lady Gilliane does love this Osbert, she would think nothing of saying she hated him, of blackening his name and betraying his honor by coupling with yo
u, me, Geoffrey, the whole troop—if she thought it would serve him.”
Adam said nothing. His eyes were all dark, the green and golden light that normally brightened them quenched.
“But I see no proof of the matter one way or the other,” Geoffrey said. “From what we know of the older de Cercy, he was a crude, treacherous brute. A man grows the way he is trained and led. It is not unlikely that the son is no better than the father was. Thus, Lady Gilliane might well have spoken the truth. Unfortunately, women are peculiar. I have known some who seemed only able to love those who abused them shamefully. Still, I tend not to think that of Lady Gilliane. She fired up finely over that matter of ordering dinner, and there is a spark in her eyes that leads me to believe she does not enjoy being ill-used.”
To his own irritation, Adam’s heart leapt at Geoffrey’s speech. It was ridiculous that he should not be able to control his own feelings. It was even more ridiculous that such feelings should be centered on a girl he had seen for the first time—aside from that glimpse on the wall—only an hour or so before, and who was already tied in marriage. His father and brother had been quite right to direct their strictures at him. Probably they had seen in his expression the effect Gilliane had had upon him. Probably she had seen it, too! Damn her! Well, he was warned now. No matter how his unruly heart sank or leapt, he would guard against falling into any trap she might lay.
Chapter Seven
Adam turned his goblet of wine and watched the torchlight play on the dark surface. Alberic had fallen respectfully silent when he saw his young master lost in thought. That was something new about Adam that Alberic had noticed only since they had come to Tarring and Lord Ian and Lord Geoffrey had left. It was common enough for Adam to join his men-at-arms in the evening when he had no noble company. He was no reader, and, unless minstrels or players came to the keep, there was nothing for a man to do if he had no lady with whom he could talk, play chess, and then bed. Adam was a convivial soul who took no pleasure in isolating himself in order to appear remote and godlike to his men. They were quite sufficiently impressed with his power and ability without that. If nothing more important drew his attention, Adam gambled with them, listened to their tales, and told a few warm stories of his own.
Gilliane (Roselynde Chronicles, Book Four) Page 11
