Lion Triumphant

by Philippa Carr

  “He will visit me each night. He has said so. Oh Honey, when I think of it…”

  “Don’t think of it. It is happening and nothing can change it. We are prisoners here and we know now for what purpose. At least he has not ill-treated you.”

  “He has only misused my body,” I said fiercely.

  “Catharine, we have come through violent adventures. This has happened. Edward is dead. My baby will soon be born. We are far from home. This man has taken you against your will, but not roughly as he might well have done.”

  “As Jake Pennlyon must have taken Isabella. But perhaps she had a chance of passivity or the consequences. I chose passivity. I wish I’d fought him now.”

  Honey said: “Be calm. Let us wait and see what happens. We don’t know from one moment to another. This man has had his will of you. It has happened to girls before. Let us try to bear what is in store for us.”

  All that day I was with Honey and I could not get out of my mind what had happened to me. I thought of it all day—myself and this cold strange man—Isabella and Jake Pennlyon. And the evening came and Maria came for me and I bathed and was anointed with the perfumed oil—he was such a fastidious gentleman—and again that night he came to me.

  Everyone in the household knew I was the Governor’s mistress. He did not wish to see me during the days, but at night he visited me. He did not stay. His visits were brief—only long enough to achieve the purpose.

  I was treated with respect. So was Honey. The hushed household was far more comfortable than the galleon and Honey was getting to the stage when she needed comfort. Jennet slipped into the new life with ease; she mourned Alfonso for a day or so, but I knew it would not be long before she took up with someone. There were menservants and I had seen the looks that came her way. Such looks would always come Jennet’s way.

  I was too deeply concerned with myself to think much of them during that first week. Often I could not believe that it was truly happening. I must wake up and find it all a dream—from the night the galleon had been in the bay and the men had called.

  Then what astonished me was that I was beginning to accept everything. The quiet daily life; the house; the beautiful gardens with flowers such as we did not grow in England; the warmth of the sun; the fruits growing in the enclosed gardens. We were free to walk about, but there were guards at the gate who prevented us leaving the house and the gardens. There was a sewing room in which were frames and canvases to be embroidered. Honey was allowed to make clothes, but I was not. I was to draw what I wanted from the cupboards in the bedroom. Clothes were put there for me to choose from. I was allowed freedom in that. They were beautiful clothes, feminine clothes, and most of them were scented with the perfume of the oil which Maria rubbed into me at the end of each day.

  Where did these clothes come from? I demanded to know. But Maria only shook her head.

  I saw him now and then. He would ride out on a fine white horse. He looked magnificent mounted. He would often be away the whole day, but he always came back at night. He always came into my bedroom at the appointed time and rarely did he speak to me.

  My moods varied—sometimes I would try to convey to him my contempt for a man who could behave so, sometimes I wanted him to know how I hated him. I wanted to shout: “Get me with child quickly that I may be rid of you.” At others: “I will be barren to spite you. What then, my revengeful lord?”

  But I never spoke either and so that first strange week passed.

  I had ceased to look for the ship on the horizon. I had accepted my fate. I had fought for myself and lost. I had been taken, ill-used; and I began to wonder how I could take my revenge on men such as Don Felipe and Jake Pennlyon, who believed that women were there for their pleasure whether it be to satisfy lust or revenge, it mattered not.

  I hated Don Felipe Gonzáles as I had hated Jake Pennlyon.

  We had made a kind of pattern of our days, Honey and I. It was March of the year 1560, and her baby was due in a few weeks’ time. I suppose impending childbirth makes everything else seem insignificant. Honey’s thoughts were all for the child. She was constantly making clothes from the materials she found in the sewing room. I was not much use with my needle, but I improved a little during those first days merely because I had to do something. I used to wonder that in a house such as this one there should be a sewing room; Honey took it for granted and was grateful for it. I supposed that these rooms had been prepared for the bride Isabella. Had she ever used them?

  I would sit making idle speculations, but Honey scarcely listened; she was absorbed by her child.

  It was a week after we had arrived at the Hacienda that we ventured into the Casa Azul. This was a small house standing in the grounds surrounded by a high wall. We had seen it from a distance and wondered what it was and on this particular morning I made up my mind to find out.

  I insisted on Honey’s accompanying me and when she saw that I was leading her to the Casa Azul she wanted to turn back.

  “Why?” I demanded.

  “There is something repellent about it.”

  “You are fanciful.”

  “I don’t want to do anything that would harm the child.”

  “Why, Honey, what’s come over you? What more can happen? Any child who could survive the last months will manage the next few weeks.”

  She came with me to the wrought-iron gates; we looked through them to a courtyard which had been made with stones of varying shades of blue which had no doubt given the house its name. There were flowering shrubs of all kinds—brilliant colors among the green foliage.

  “It’s beautiful,” I said.

  “It’s gloomy,” insisted Honey.

  I pushed open the wrought-iron gate and beckoned Honey. Rather reluctantly she followed me.

  There was an air of silent mystery in the courtyard. Windows looked down at us, all with their balconies shut in by wrought iron. They were picturesque and one imagined girls wearing red petticoats and black lace mantillas seated there. Against the wall was a wooden seat with a trellis back. I tiptoed into the courtyard and sat down.

  Honey followed me reluctantly. “Has it occurred to you that we might be trespassing?”

  I said: “This is part of his estate. I will see all I can of it.”

  Honey looked distressed as she did when I talked of him, and I did not wish to talk of him either. By day I wanted to forget those furtive visits.

  As we sat there I was aware of a movement at one of the windows and a child stepped onto the balcony. She was like a doll, I thought; she wore black velvet with a white lace frill at her neck and wrists; her long dark hair hung about her shoulders. I guessed her to be about eleven or twelve years old.

  She called out something in Spanish which I gathered to be “Who are you?”

  I answered in English. “We are at the Hacienda.”

  She put her fingers to her lips as though warning me to silence; she said something else and disappeared.

  “What a beautiful little girl!” said Honey. “I wonder who she is.”

  The girl had come into the courtyard. She was holding a doll in a red satin petticoat and a black mantilla. It was rather like herself.

  She held the doll out to us and made it bow; I curtsied and she laughed aloud. There was something arresting about her besides her beauty, for there was a strangeness about her enormous dark eyes.

  She held out her hand and took mine. We all sat down together on the seat. Then she noticed that Honey was pregnant, or so it seemed; her face puckered suddenly and she began to cry out: “No. No.” She hid her face in her hands on which several rings sparkled; I noticed gold bracelets on her wrists. Then she turned her back on Honey as though she were determined to forget she was there and when she looked at me she was smiling happily.

  She muttered something in which I caught the words bella and muñeca and as I thought she was talking about her doll I replied in stumbling Spanish that the doll was a very beautiful one. She started to rock it as
one would a child and I thought then that she looked too old for this kind of play.

  Then at the door from which she had emerged a figure appeared.

  “Isabella!” said a voice shrill and commanding.

  Although I had begun to guess, the shock was none the less great. This was his wife then. This was the girl who had suffered at the hands of Jake Pennlyon.

  Isabella rose obediently and went to the woman. She put her arms about her, the doll held by one arm dangling down as she did so. A flood of words came from the woman, scolding and tender, I judged from the tones. Over the girl’s head the woman studied us. Her eyes were sharp, piercing under straggling black brows in which the occasional white hair was visible.

  She took the girl’s hand and drew her toward the door, but Isabella suddenly became petulant, crying, “No. No,” and turned to stare at us. She extricated herself from the woman’s arms and came over to stand before us. I was aware then of a scent which was familiar to me; it was the same as that which was in the toilet room and of which the clothes I wore smelled faintly. It was in the bedroom where I suffered my nightly humiliations. I wondered what it was.

  The girl spoke to us, but as it was in Spanish I could not understand; then the woman came and took her by the hand and led her firmly away.

  She turned to us at the door and spat out a word which I assumed meant “Go away.”

  The door shut and we were alone in the courtyard.

  “What a strange scene,” I said.

  “We deserved all we got. We had no right to be here. I wonder who the girl was.”

  “She must be his Isabella,” I said.

  “You mean … his wife? But she was a child.”

  The door into the courtyard had opened and Richard Rackell stood there.

  “Come away,” he said quickly. “You should not have gone there.”

  “Is it forbidden?” I asked coldly. I could never forget the part he had played in betraying us.

  “There have been no express orders,” he said holding open the door. He went on: “Please.”

  As we walked away he went on: “It was a terrible tragedy.”

  “Whatever happened,” I said fiercely, “does not excuse what has been done to us, nor those who helped to do it.”

  “You have seen the Lady Isabella,” he said. “She is as a child. She became so after the Rampant Lion came here. It affected her mind. She lives like a child with her duenna.”

  I said: “She is beautiful.”

  “You see a beautiful shell which holds nothing. Her mind is incapable of retaining anything; she has reverted to her childhood. Her interest is in her dolls. It is a great tragedy. You understand.”

  I wanted to be alone. I could not get out of my mind the memory of that beautiful face which was devoid of the light of understanding.

  The perfume too. I began to understand more. He tried to imagine that I was Isabella. I had to wear her clothes; use her perfume; he wanted to delude himself that the woman to whom he came each night was Isabella.

  My attitude toward him had changed. I was sorry for him. I pictured his returning from his expedition expecting to find his beautiful bride waiting for him; the marriage ceremony would have been fixed; he and his lovely highborn Isabella were to be husband and wife. Isabella may have been a child of fifteen, but they married young in Spain; and Felipe Gonzáles was a gentleman; with great courteousness he would have wooed his wife and initiated her into the bedchamber rituals in such a manner as would have been acceptable to her. Instead of which Jake Pennlyon had come with his crude buccaneering ways and he had taken this delicately nurtured creature and crushed her, for crushed she was, poor little bud who had been cruelly deflowered before the blossoms came. And her mind had become unhinged.

  I hate you, Jake Pennlyon, I thought; and my feelings against that man were intense while I could only feel pity for Felipe Gonzáles.

  Jake Pennlyon! How I wished I had never seen him. He had brought me nothing but disaster. Here I was a prisoner, each night submitted to an intolerable humiliation—because of Jake Pennlyon. My pride was ignored; my body was used to satisfy revenge. I was a substitute for a beautiful young girl whose mind had been destroyed by Jake Pennlyon and my seducer had to imagine that I was this girl in order to make love—if one could use such a word in this connection—to me.

  In addition to my humbled pride I was getting anxious about Honey. Her time was near. In the first year of her marriage she had had a miscarriage and I remembered my mother’s saying that the next time she must take the greatest care. In a few weeks now her child would be born; and what would happen if it came before its time? Who would care for her?

  I decided to see Felipe Gonzáles. I had seen very little of him really. I wondered whether he avoided me by day. Ours must have been one of the strangest relationships which ever existed.

  I knew that at certain times of the day he was often in the room which was called his escritorio and I decided that I would see him there. When I considered my feelings I realized that they had changed since I had seen Isabella. I was piqued because of what was implied in the fact that I had to wear Isabella’s clothes and use her scent; at the same time I felt a certain sympathy for him. I could imagine so much of what must have taken place: his arranged marriage which would have been ideal; his return to find his beautiful wife reduced to a shell. I imagined the ceremony of marriage which had followed and Isabella’s screaming terror when he approached her; and then the knowledge that she was to bear a child—Jake Pennlyon’s child. It was a tragedy and I understood how he must have called forth the wrath of heaven on the man who was responsible. I even understood his vow of vengeance.

  I was also angry that I, so desired by Jake Pennlyon and others, should have to be tricked out as someone else before this man could be sufficiently aroused to carry out his purpose. It was a vain and stupid emotion, I suppose, but I felt it.

  I had to see him and it was a fact that I was anxious about Honey.

  He was seated at a table with papers before him. He rose as I entered.

  “I gave orders that no one was to disturb me,” he said.

  “I have to see you,” I replied. “There is something of importance that I must say to you.”

  He bowed again—always courteous. I was glad of the darkened room. I felt embarrassed; I could have sworn he did too. Here we were two strangers by day but who by night shared the ultimate intimacy.

  I said: “I have come to see you on behalf of my sister.”

  He looked relieved. I sat down and he resumed his seat.

  “As you know she is shortly to have a child. At any moment her time may come. I should like to know what can be done for her.”

  “We have many servants,” he said.

  “She will need a midwife.”

  “There is a midwife in La Laguna.”

  “Then she must be brought here. It was no fault of my sister’s that she was taken away.”

  He conceded this. “Nor of any of us,” I went on angrily, hating his cold manner and thinking of his deluding himself that I was Isabella. “We have been dragged from our home to suit your evil purpose.”

  He held up his hand. “Enough,” he said. “The midwife shall be sent for.”

  “I suppose you would like me to thank you, but I find it difficult to thank you for anything.”

  “It is not necessary. Suffice it that the midwife shall come.”

  He half rose in his chair—a gesture of dismissal. But I did not wish to be dismissed. I was angry to be used in this manner and seeing him there in his elegant clothes, his cold face expressionless, his manner so precise, and thinking again of those nightly encounters and the way in which I had been used, robbed of my dignity, my will, everything to serve his revengeful purpose, my anger was so intense that I wanted to hurt him.

  I said: “I can only pray that ere long I shall be free of you.”

  “It is too soon yet,” he said. “But I pray with you that we shall both soon
be relieved of this irksome duty.”

  My anger was so great that I could have struck him.

  I cried: “You appear to have no great difficulty in performing this irksome duty.”

  “It is good of you to concern yourself on my behalf. May I assure you that we have substances which if taken judiciously arouse desire in the most reluctant.”

  “And how long am I expected to submit to this distasteful duty of yours?”

  “Rest assured that as soon as I am certain that my efforts have borne fruit I shall with the utmost pleasure and relief abandon my visits to you.”

  “I think I may well by this time be with child.”

  “We must be sure,” he said.

  “It is such an effort for you. I thought but to spare you.”

  “I have no wish to be spared from my revenge. The sooner I can effect it, the better.”

  “And when you are certain that your loathsome seed is growing within me I shall be taken back to my home?”

  “You will be returned to your affianced husband in the same condition that Isabella was left to me.”

  “You are indeed a vengeful man,” I said. “Others must be trampled underfoot for the sake of your revenge.”

  “It is often so.”

  “I despise you for your cruelty, your indifference to others, for your cold and calculating revengeful nature. But I suppose that is of no importance to you.”

  “None whatever,” he replied; and this time he stood up and bowed.

  So I left him. But I kept thinking about him all day and wondering how I could be revenged on him.

  Later that day the midwife rode into the courtyard on a mule and was brought to Honey. To our delight the woman could speak a little English. She was middle-aged and had been with a family in Cádiz which had had two English servants. Her English was of course limited, but it was a great relief to find she could understand a little.

  She told us that Honey’s condition was good and that the child was due in the next week or so. She would ask that she might stay at the Hacienda so that they would not have to send for her in the night.