The Fair Maid of Kent

by Caroline Newark

  His brother? Why was he talking about his brother?

  ‘No, I haven’t, Sir Thomas. Why would I? I don’t concern myself with the various members of your family.’

  ‘Would you like me to tell you?’

  He really was the most annoying of men sometimes.

  ‘I suppose you intend to tell me whether I ask you or not, so very well – where is your brother?’

  He smiled broadly. ‘Otho is in England at this moment, guarding a particularly valuable property of mine.’

  ‘I presume you also wish me to ask you which valuable property.’

  ‘I think you might be interested.’

  ‘Sir Thomas, I am not interested in anything you or your brother do. It is no business of mine.’

  I was curious but I certainly wasn’t going to let him know that.

  ‘My brother is working valiantly on my behalf, looking after a friend of mine, Raoul de Brienne, the Count of Eu.’

  I must have looked completely mystified because he sighed. ‘The Count of Eu is the Constable of France and at present he is my prisoner.’

  ‘Oh!’ I said. ‘Caen! You captured him at Caen.’

  ‘Yes. The count and I fought together in the Holy Crusade against the heathens. We were friends and when the prince’s men stormed the bridge at Caen and he was trapped, he surrendered his sword to me.’

  There was a silence in which he idly picked up some sand and let it trickle through his fingers. I stared at the gap in the dunes through which I could just make out the sea, a line of dark blue crested with white. I was beginning to feel sleepy with the warmth and would have quite liked to lie down and close my eyes but I certainly wasn’t going to with Thomas Holand sitting beside me.

  ‘The king has offered to purchase the Count of Eu from me for the sum of eighty thousand florins.’

  That jolted me out of my drowsiness. Eighty thousand florins!

  ‘But that’s a fortune.’

  ‘Yes, it is.’

  I remembered the orchard in Ghent where he had once told me how war makes men’s fortunes and how the greatest prize of all was a prisoner to ransom.

  ‘So now you are rich.’

  ‘I am. Not as rich as Sir William will be one day. I’ll never be that rich. But rich enough.’

  Rich enough for what, I wondered. To purchase a manor or two or three, to clothe himself in silks and furs, to have a stable full of the very best horses, to buy himself a wife. Of course, this was why he’d brought me here, to break the news that after Calais he would be going away. He would leave William’s service and I’d never see him again except perhaps at some great feast given by the king where Sir Thomas and Lady Holand would take their places at the lower tables and talk of their happy life together.

  A large tear rolled down my cheek.

  ‘Why are you crying?’

  ‘I’m not,’ I snapped, wiping my face with my hand. ‘Why would you think I was crying? It’s nothing but the wind.’

  ‘Aren’t you interested in what I’m going to do with my fortune now that I’ve got it?’

  ‘I suppose like all men you’ll use it to enrich yourself further by buying the things men do to impress others.’

  He regarded me seriously. ‘Not at all. I’ve decided to use my fortune to settle a long-running dispute over a piece of my property. I wish to see justice done in this matter.’

  William was constantly going to law over the boundaries of his manors and the trespasses of others into his parks and it was disappointing to see that Thomas Holand was no different.

  ‘That will hardly use up the whole of your fortune, Sir Thomas. My cousin’s justice is not that costly.’

  ‘Oh I don’t think I will receive justice at your cousin’s hands, my lady. I think I shall have to aim higher.’

  ‘There is no higher justice in the land than the king’s justice.’

  ‘Except where the Church rules.’

  ‘The bishops’ courts?’

  ‘Not even the bishops. In the matter of retrieving what has been stolen from me I have been told my only hope is to petition His Holiness and that is a very costly business indeed.’

  ‘The Holy Father? In Avignon?’

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. What property could possibly be valuable enough?

  His words, when he spoke, came from a very long way away.

  ‘I shall ask His Holiness to order the return of my wife.’

  For a moment there was nothing to be heard but the gentle surge of the sea beyond the dunes. The gulls were silent; no voices, no chinking bridles, no passing footsteps, no distant clanging of bells; not even the low rumble of a farmer’s wagon travelling along the causeway. I sat perfectly still in this newfound silence as melting ice came slithering through my veins and the little hollow where we sat began to spiral around me.

  ‘You can’t do that.’

  He gave a half smile. ‘I think you’ll find I can. You’re my wife and I want you back.’

  Amongst the sparse tufts of grass, little pink flowers tucked themselves close against the ground as if afraid to push their heads any higher into the air. A small insect leapt onto my hand before hopping off into the sand where it buried itself in an instant leaving behind just a few tiny trickling grains which quickly disappeared.

  ‘I’m not your wife,’ I said in a voice which trembled far too much. ‘I can’t be. I’m married to William. I’ve been his wife for six years. I sit by his side in the hall. Everyone knows I’m his wife.’

  He leaned forward and spoke slowly. I could feel the warmth of his breath on my face and there was nowhere to hide from his words.

  ‘You are not his wife, you’re mine. I am the one who will decide where you live and when I tell the Holy Father what happened between us in Ghent, he will agree. It may cost me half my fortune and some months of the king’s displeasure, but I want you back.’

  ‘I don’t want to live with you in a hovel,’ I said in rising panic, imagining the mud and the rush-lights and the hard brown bread. There would be beaten-earth floors and wooden bowls and a pallet bed with dirty sheets. I’d seen how lesser people lived and I wasn’t going to give up what I had to starve in a wayside shack with Thomas Holand. I wasn’t going to leave the glories of Bisham for some cold northern bogland where the women wore homespun and nobody ate meat except on a feast day.

  He gave a short laugh.

  ‘Don’t be foolish. You won’t have to live in a hovel. I have a good solid manor house where we’ll live together. And if you find it too small, I’ll build a solar.’

  I said nothing, appalled at the thought of losing everything.

  ‘I’ll plant you a pleasure garden if that’s what you want,’ he said softly. ‘And there’ll be a dovecote.’

  ‘But I’m to be Countess of Salisbury,’ I cried, despairing of making him understand how impossible this was. ‘I can’t sit with you at the lower tables. I have to sit on a velvet cushion alongside the queen and be served from her dishes. I don’t want to sup pottage with you.’

  He sighed as if explaining matters to a small child. ‘My lady, I can’t make you a countess. I’ll never have as many manors as Sir William and I’ll never be an earl no matter how high I climb but I promise I will look after you well. You won’t want for anything.’

  ‘What about my household? I can’t manage without them. I won’t know what to do. I can’t brew ale or bake bread or any of those things.’

  He had the rudeness to laugh at my panic-stricken expression.

  ‘Don’t worry. I won’t expect you to bake bread. I have servants. My wife’s place will not be in the kitchens.’

  ‘So where will my place be in this house which is not a hovel and which doesn’t yet have a solar?’ I demanded.

  �
�Where would you like it to be?’

  I knew what he was thinking. It was written all over his face. I felt the heat rush into my cheeks as he continued eyeing me like some delectable morsel he could hardly wait to get his hands on. He’d tricked me into his bed once but I refused to be duped a second time.

  ‘Why don’t you get yourself some other wife,’ I said sullenly. ‘It should be easy for someone like you. Why not go back to your manor and find a plump little country nobody with a wealthy father who won’t mind the mud or the lack of a solar? Why not put her in your bed?’

  He leaned across the gap between us and took my hand in his. I tried to pull away but he had it held much too tightly.

  ‘Because I happen to want you in my bed. You’re my wife. It’s where you belong.’

  ‘I do not belong in your bed.’

  He raised an eyebrow and regarded me with some amusement.

  ‘I thought you enjoyed being in my bed. Was I mistaken?’

  He had removed his hat and the sun was gilding the unruly hairs on the top of his head. The sensation which had been steadily growing in my belly sent shivers through the whole of my body as my resolve faltered and I felt faint.

  ‘William will never let me go,’ I said in a small voice. ‘He won’t allow you to take me.’

  ‘I don’t expect him to hand you over willingly. It would be a foolish man indeed who’d do that and, whatever else he is, Montagu is no fool.’

  ‘And how will you persuade him? With a band of armed retainers? Swords and cudgels at the ready? You won’t get further than the outer gate of Bisham. He’ll have you cut down before you set foot in the inner courtyard.’

  ‘He’ll put up a fight but if the Holy Father commands your return, he’ll have no choice but to obey. I shall bring an order from the papal court and that is something a man ignores at his peril. Montagu won’t risk excommunication and the damnation of his soul.’

  This was all going too fast. He was going to take me away from Bisham whatever happened. I could be screaming with fear and clinging to the bed curtains but he’d take no notice. He’d drag me outside and throw me up onto his saddle.

  ‘If you force me to leave I shall be penniless,’ I said, flatly. ‘There’ll be no money. Everything I have belongs to Sir William. I shall bring you nothing. The Montagu marriage was a cause of great joy to my mother, and my family would see me dead rather than dishonoured like this. They won’t bargain with you or help you in any way. There will be no dowry. Nothing. So why would you want me when all I shall bring you is trouble?’

  ‘Don’t you know?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Can’t you guess?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Oh my lady, I thought you would know by now. Wandering round the streets of Villeneuve with you these past months, I realised a truth; one which I have denied for too long. I happen to love you. Not desire you, but love you. Desire is a simple matter and easily cured but love is something else entirely.’

  ‘You’ve never loved me,’ I cried. ‘All those pretty words you said in Ghent; you never meant any of them. I thought you loved me but you didn’t.’

  He moved so that he was next to me and took both my hands in his.

  ‘You know I am a sinner, I’ve made no secret of it, but even a sinner can be redeemed in this life. You were barely more than a child when I first met you, a pretty young girl I wanted in the way I would have wanted any pretty young girl. Naturally I didn’t love you. When I married you it wasn’t for love. Only a fool marries for love.’

  ‘I loved you,’ I muttered.

  ‘No you didn’t,’ he said. ‘It wasn’t love, it was a girl’s fancy, a green sickness, nothing more.’

  ‘How do you know what I felt?’

  He laughed. ‘You forget. I have sisters. I know about young girls. In and out of love as often as the seasons change. Think of the men you’ve sighed over in the years since that night in Ghent, men you have dreamed of, wept tears for. One? Two? Three perhaps?’

  When I blushed, he laughed. ‘You see.’

  ‘I see nothing but a man who is bent on destroying my life.’

  ‘If I destroy the life you have today, I shall give you a new one. You will be Lady Holand and I shall make you happy.’

  Happy? There were few times I could say I’d been truly happy since I married William. Here in Villeneuve perhaps, these past months? But it was Thomas who had leaned against the pillar in the cloth hall while I’d chosen the silks for my gowns: “Not the yellow,” he’d said, watching me through half-closed eyes. “The blue. It suits you better.”

  And when I’d wanted a small gift for Margaret’s name day, he’d patiently taken me from shop to shop while I’d hesitated over dozens of little fairings until he’d finally told me which one to buy, the perfect one which had delighted my very particular cousin who had so wanted to be with us but who had been ordered to remain in England by her husband.

  It was Thomas who had whispered snippets of gossip in my ear and made me laugh; who’d taken me to taverns and pie shops which William would never have done. He’d shown me the vast warehouses stuffed full of corn and had suggested, outrageously, that we might climb the ladder to the hayloft. “It’s dark,” he had said in a low voice. “No-one goes there at this time of day. We’d be quite alone”. “No, thank you,” I’d replied. He’d smiled and said, “Very well, not yet.” “Not ever,” I’d said smartly and walked out into the daylight.

  We’d played this game daily until the Valois king and his army put a stop to it and it wasn’t until our time was ended that I realised where it had been leading.

  ‘What if His Holiness denies your petition?’ I said. ‘What if he decides I am truly married to William? Which of course I am.’

  ‘Then I shall have made both your life and mine that bit more hazardous. Once Montagu knows there will be no unknowing.’

  ‘Is what you’re going to do so very dangerous?’

  ‘Yes. Challenging one of the king’s friends is always dangerous and the papal court is like a snake pit. Would you rather I left it alone and did nothing?’

  I put my head down and looked at my feet. Did I wish him to leave it alone? Did I really wish him to disappear out of my life? I raised my eyes and caught his gaze. There was something in the way he was looking at me that I hadn’t seen before, a tenderness which I steadfastly refused to believe was love.

  ‘Perhaps it would be safer to let things lie,’ I said slowly, hating myself for being a coward. ‘I wouldn’t want to see you hurt. We could carry on the way we are, seeing each other like this.’

  ‘So I leave my wife in another man’s hall and content myself with the knowledge that it is he who takes her to bed each night, not me. Do you really imagine I can agree to that?’

  ‘I could meet you in secret,’ I said, doubtfully. ‘I could come to your lodgings if you took a room… I could…’ I didn’t know how to say the words. ‘I could be your concubine.’

  He roared with laughter and fell back, his head in the sand, the sun in his face. He grasped my sleeve and pulled me down beside him. There was a sudden shock at the intimacy and then a warm sensation of familiarity. He encircled me with his arms and I found to my surprise I had no desire to struggle free.

  ‘If I wanted a concubine, my lady, I’d choose you above anyone, but I happen to want a wife.’ He rolled over and kissed me gently on the mouth. ‘And I have a fancy to have a son.’

  My lips trembled. I felt blood drain from my face and tears well up in my eyes.

  ‘But what if I can’t? What if…?’

  He kissed me again, his lips brushing mine in the gentlest of kisses.

  ‘We will make babies together, you and I; of that I’m certain. A clutch of little Holands to grace our fireside in the years ahead. God will bless our marria
ge because it is a true marriage. It was hurried and the surroundings may not have been as grand as you would have liked but it was no less a true marriage for all that.’

  ‘Was it?’ I whispered. ‘Was it truly a marriage made before God? I thought perhaps it was a nothing, just a deception.’

  ‘God sees everything we do. He doesn’t need a priest or a bishop to open the shutters onto our lives. Even in that tiny attic room He saw and heard what we did. We promised ourselves, one to the other, as husband and wife and when we were alone, we joined ourselves the way men and woman have always done since the time of Adam and Eve. What was that if it wasn’t a marriage?’

  His eyes were dark and warm with love, and the words he spoke dripped like honey into my ears. But I was not yet convinced by what my heart was telling me.

  ‘Did I really please you?’ I said uncertainly,

  He tightened his grip and pulled my head onto his shoulder.

  ‘I have had many women in my life and a great deal of pleasure in the having of them, but I have never enjoyed myself as much as I did that night with you. You were a revelation and I could hardly believe my luck in what I had in my arms. It was like lifting a stone at the edge of a stream to find a sparkling jewel hidden beneath and realising it was yours for the taking. Do you understand now why I was so angry with you when you married Montagu? I’d not only lost my path to great favours from the king but also the most alluring young woman I’d ever had in my bed.’

  I giggled and settled myself more comfortably in his arms.

  ‘Am I really alluring?’

  He kissed he tip of my nose. ‘Very.’

  He stroked away the lock of hair which had come loose across my face and kissed my forehead, my ears and the lids of my eyes. With my fingers I traced the contours of his face.

  ‘Will you show me your eye?’ I asked, curious at last to see what lay beneath his evil-looking patch.

  He smiled and guided my fingers up to the narrow ribbon.

  ‘Go on,’ he said. ‘You do it.’