Cursed in the Blood: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery
Page 37
It was a long time after he was well enough that he felt he could make love with Catherine again. Her patience was sorely tried. Finally one night she had grabbed his left arm and run the end of it up and down her naked body.
“There,” she said. “I’m not disgusted. I’m not repelled. Are you? It there something wrong with me? Have I aged so? Do you find my swollen, drooping breasts repulsive? Your son certainly doesn’t. Edgar, I can’t wait any longer. Don’t you love me anymore?”
She looked at him in exasperation.
Edgar didn’t know how to answer. Then he realized that he didn’t have to. His body was doing it for him. Catherine noticed. She grinned in anticipation.
“Oh, Edgar, I have missed you so.”
“I’m sorry, leoffest.” He pulled her closer. “I’ll never go away again.”
Solomon came back from London in the spring looking more worried than Catherine had ever seen him. When questioned, he would only say that there had been some sort of trouble in the town of Norwich but that he was sure it was an isolated incident. He didn’t want to talk about it but busied himself with the interrupted negotiations with Robert, taking Margaret with him to translate as her mother had.
The arrangements for taking Margaret to France with them weren’t as difficult as Catherine feared. Waldeve was too concerned with fighting the judgment of the archbishop of York, that he became a serf of Hexham to live out his days in penance for the double crime of maiming his own son and attempting murder in a place of sanctuary. He felt no guilt, only rage. He had no interest in what happened to his daughter.
Duncan, as her eldest surviving brother, was relieved to be free of the responsibility.
“Just so you’re responsible for her dowry,” he told Edgar. “I don’t want you applying to me for funds to marry her off.”
He returned to Wedderlie, to rebuild the castle with the king’s permission. By the winter of 1144, even Duncan had realized that following William Cumin was hopeless. It was only a matter of time before he would be forced to turn over the keys to the palace to William of Saint-Barbe. Duncan decided to stay on land he could be sure of.
He tried to get Robert to help him.
“The villagers can’t be trusted not to put a knife in my back,” Duncan pleaded. “You’re not good for much, but I know you won’t murder me in my sleep.”
“Only because you’re not worth the trouble,” Robert answered. “No, they’re your people now. You deal with them. I’ll stay on my own land, thank you. I don’t want to be lord over anyone. I can’t even master my own soul.”
Duncan rolled his eyes in disgust. “Sweet Saint Sidwell’s bloody scythe! You should be enslaved to Hexham instead of Father. You’d never know the difference.”
He went back to the ruins of Wedderlie, determined to make life miserable for everyone there. The villagers, in turn, planned to do the same to him.
No one ever told Duncan about the windmill, and he spent the next twenty years wondering why revenues from his mill on the river were so meager.
It was almost summer before they boarded the boat to take them back to France. Catherine spent the entire voyage with her head in a bucket again, but this time she suspected her stomach problems might be compounded by morning sickness. It didn’t seem a good time to tell Edgar, though. She decided to wait until she was certain and they were settled at home again.
Hubert had been warned in a letter from Catherine of what had happened to Edgar. He kept his doubts to himself and greeted them with all appearance of delight, genuinely rejoicing at his healthy grandson. He showed Edgar sympathy but no patronage.
“No work has been done on the extension since you left,” he grumbled instead. “A year I’ve had the back of the house torn up. Do you think you can get it completed before the rain comes this year?”
“I’ll see if the men I hired are still available,” Edgar promised. “We can start work within the week. Are you sure you want to commit to rebuilding? Are matters here settled?”
Hubert pursed his lips.
“The bishop seemed satisfied that the rumors about me were slanders, spread by competitors,” he said “But Eliazar and Johanna have received permission to move to Troyes and they intend to go. It grieves me greatly, but it may be for the best. Things in Paris are too unsettled. There’s even talk of King Louis taking the cross and mounting an army to the Holy Land in penance for the fire at Vitry.”
Edgar knew what had happened to Hubert’s family the last time a great army was raised to take back Jerusalem. He could almost read the memory in Hubert’s haunted eyes.
“Well, then,” Edgar said, “returning pilgrims often bring back a taste for foreign goods and spices. Business should increase.”
Hubert smiled. “I’ll need help, you know. A trader only needs his right hand, after all. Don’t be offended, man. You can’t fight and you can’t carve toys, thank goodness, but you can shake hands to seal a pact and raise your hand to Heaven to swear to your promise. You may not think you have much of a future, but you can be of use to me, if you will.”
Edgar thought a moment, then nodded. “I’ve cut all the bonds to my family, except my sister, who is now under my care. For her sake, and that of my son, I accept your offer.”
He held out his good hand. Solemnly, Hubert took it.
Margaret was welcomed into the household and soon knew all the corners of Paris almost as well as Willa. There were still nights when she woke up crying for her mother. Catherine realized that there would always be such nights, as long as Margaret lived. But the joy of living in a place where everyone was fond of her and each other helped the child recover. Catherine and Edgar fretted over what would become of her but for now it was enough to let her heal and be a child. Everything was fine, except for Eliazar’s proposed move to Champagne. One night Catherine started to put James in his own cradle and then realized that he had outgrown it.
“We’ll put him in an open chest for now,” she told Edgar. “But you’ll have to make him a new bed soon. Oh, it’s so good to be home.”
Edgar lay awake long after she had gone to sleep, thinking of her unconscious comment. A year before he could have made a child’s bed in a day. Now … now the only work that gave him joy was gone. He heard the bells of Paris toll the hours calling the various monks and canons to their prayers. Finally, he slid quietly out of bed and down to the back garden.
It was still there, propped up in a corner. James’s Trojan horse. There were a few dried walnuts in the basket next to it. Edgar sat on his stool and stared at it for a long time.
At last he picked it up with his good hand. It slipped and he caught it against the stump of the other. He swore. Then he pushed the basket of nuts across the floor with one foot. He sat back on the stool and wedged the horse against his chest with his left arm.
He picked up a walnut and began to rub the wood smooth, tears streaming down his face.
Edgar’s Family
Catherine’s Family
The Anglo-Rorman North
Acknowledgments
All of the people listed below have been of great help in advising me on this book. Any mistakes herein are completely due to my own perversity or lack of comprehension.
Dr. Tess Gerritsen, for not thinking I was crazy when I asked her about amputations and for giving me excellent advice on that grisly subject.
Prof. Bert Hall, University of Toronto, for setting me straight on windmills and for believing that Catherine and I both had the intelligence to understand his explanation.
Rebecca T. Hill, R.N., for telling me what to do until the medicus arrives.
Prof. Lester Little, Smith College, for finding the malediction from which this book is titled and for allowing me to use it.
Prof. Nicholas Howe, Ohio State University, for sending me the Durham poem and checking my Anglo-Saxon curses.
Prof. Brian Patrick McGuire, Roskilde University, Denmark, many thanks for all his advice and help on Aelred of Rievaulx.
Roger Norris, and also Wendy and Ivy; Cathedral Library of Durham, for allowing me to do research at the library, for getting the books and manuscripts out before I arrived, for finding a place to plug in my laptop so I could work and for providing a friendly atmosphere in which to work.
Prof. David Rollason, Durham University, for suggesting that I write about the bishops of Durham and then providing me with the chance to do the research there.
Prof. Jeffrey Russell, UC Santa Barbara, for enduring my questions, correcting my Latin and slogging through Lawrence of Durham’s turgid imitation Vergil for me.
Prof. Richard Unger, University of British Columbia, for getting everyone across the channel without anachronisms. (I hope.)
Prof. Linda Voigts, University of Missouri, for help with dwale and advice on medieval medicine.
Prof. Alan Young, University College of Ripon & York, St. John, for allowing me to read his notes for his monograph, William Cumin: Border Politics and the Bishopric of Durham 1141—1144 and for being so enthusiastic about having his work becoming the basis for a mystery novel.
By Sharan Newman from Tom Doherty Associates
Death Comes As Epiphany
The Devil’s Door
The Wandering Arm
Strong As Death
Cursed in the Blood
Guinevere
The Chessboard Queen
Guinevere Evermore
Afterword
This book is a work of fiction. Catherine, Edgar and their families are made up from my own imagination. However, the world they live in is real and so are many of the events and people. William Cumin did attempt to take over the bishopric of Durham at this time, and the story of it is much more complex than I could capture in this book. Alan Young has written a thorough history of Cumin, published by the Borthwick Institute, York.
Aelred was in 1143 a monk and later an abbot of Rievaulx. His history is in his own writings and analyzed in a fascinating study by Brian Patrick McGuire called Brother and Lover, Crossroad Press, 1994. Godric of Finchale lived as a hermit near Durham for more than half a century and was over a hundred when he died. Unfortunately, as far as I know there is no good translation of his life story.
For further information on the books mentioned above and for a bibliography of the other sources used in this book, please write to me in care of the publisher. Usually, less than ten percent of my research is actually used in the story, and I would love to direct those interested to the rest of it. But my goal, as always, is to entertain. If I have done that, it even makes the horror of reading Lawrence of Durham worthwhile. Thank you.
—Sharan
This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this novel are either fictitious or are used fictitiously.
CURSED IN THE BLOOD
Copyright © 1998 by Sharan Newman
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form.
A Forge Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010
Forge® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.
Map by Ellisa Mitchell
eISBN 9781466817289
First eBook Edition : March 2012
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Newman, Sharan.
Cursed in the blood / Sharan Newman.—1st ed. p. cm.
“A Tom Doherty Associates book.”
ISBN 0-312-86567-8 ISBN 978-0-312-86567-2
1. Scotland—History—1057—1603—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3564.E926C87 1998
813’.54—dc21
98-14608
CIP
First Edition: August 1998