Circle of Pearls

by Rosalind Laker

  When Dr Broadcourt arrived Anne was having what her daughter would have termed a good day. He asked Makepeace to allow him to present himself to her and not to come into the room until called for. Anne was pleased to have such an agreeable visitor, for he was a charming man with silken manners and she was touched that Makepeace should have shown such concern for her health. While he questioned her in a conversational manner she poured him a cup of fragrant Chinese tea.

  ‘This is delicious, Mrs Walker,’ he said, taking a sip from the porcelain cup.

  ‘I thought coffee was proving more popular to date with all the coffee-houses springing up everywhere.’

  ‘I believe these two drinks will always be rivals, madam. I defy anyone to declare one better than the other. You mentioned earlier that you drink a cup of tea in the evenings sometimes. Does it keep you awake? In fact, how well do you sleep?’

  Instantly she was wary. Was Makepeace suspicious of her whereabouts at night? Had the physician come to trick her into revealing where she went? She looked down at the brown liquid in her cup. ‘I get plenty of sleep,’ she answered truthfully, totting up the hours she dozed during rest periods.

  He was satisfied with her reply, but he noticed that she was no longer relaxed with him. Somehow he had disturbed her. She was on edge, her eyes opaque and distant, a trembling in her hands. Their previous easy talk was at an end. ‘Are you looking forward to your baby, Mrs Walker?’

  Her face became utterly blissful. ‘It is the greatest blessing. My husband has always wanted another child and so have I.’

  He was puzzled. ‘But I understood from Mr Walker that he has no children.’

  She did not answer him, her thoughts on their own trail. ‘My daughter, Julia, and Mary Twyat are busy sewing and embroidering garments for the new infant.’

  ‘Don’t you sew yourself?’

  Instantly panic flooded her eyes. This physician was here to trick her. ‘Mr Walker doesn’t like to see me with a needle and thread.’

  Dr Broadcourt drew his conclusion there and then. This sensitive, gentle woman was frightened of her husband. He had seen it when sleep had been discussed and again now. He talked to her a little longer and then at his suggestion she tugged the bell-pull to summon a servant to ask her husband to come to the room. He watched her closely as Makepeace entered and saw her face lose all expression like a flower closing its petals. She answered her husband slowly as if she had drawn away, and she forgot to pour him a cup of tea until he reminded her.

  Dr Broadcourt gave Makepeace his opinion when they were on their own. ‘Your wife is absorbed in her pregnancy. Many women in her condition are the same. I also suggest to you that her marital duties have become repugnant to her at this time, again a common enough development, but everything will return to normal after the birth. You have nothing to worry about, but I advise you to resign yourself to celibacy for the remaining months. Cosset and cherish her, sir. She is of nervous disposition, which will only worsen if you are not extremely patient with her at the present time.’

  Makepeace was annoyed by what he saw as the slurs that the physician had made against him. He knew himself to be a monument of patience as far as Anne was concerned. No husband could be more devoted or more eager for the son she was to bear him and through whom he would found a new dynasty at Sotherleigh.

  Not long after the physician’s visit Anne felt the baby quicken. It happened one morning when she was taking a stroll for exercise with Makepeace. She would have liked to wander through the Knot Garden, but this man, who had somehow thrust himself into her life as another husband, always steered her away from it, although she had explained that it held romantic memories for her when she had come as a young bride to Sotherleigh.

  ‘What is the matter. Anne?’ he asked, for she had halted as they were halfway along one of the long paths bordered by shrubs and spring flowers.

  She was in a state of supreme happiness at the tell-tale flutter in her womb and stood with her face tilted skywards, pressing both hands to her stomach through the layers of her skirts. ‘Our child has life,’ she breathed to Robert.

  Then the man at her side, whose name she could not always remember, gave a kind of strangled shout of exultation. Hastening her out of sight behind a box-hedge, he violated her modesty by thrusting his hand up under her petticoats, his palm pressed flat against her belly to feel that movement for himself. But the babe was resting again after that first kick and he felt nothing. Wave after wave of aversion for this man went through her to such an extent that she fainted and did not recover consciousness until she opened her eyes to find herself in the house with Julia waving astringent herbs under her nose.

  That night, in her impatience to get to the attic to be alone with Robert at this special time, she did not wait to make sure that Makepeace was soundly asleep. Normally he slept as soon as he closed his eyes, but since coming to bed he had felt the butterfly stirrings of his child and that had excited him. His hand was still on her when she slid from the bed while he was only on the surface of sleep. He supposed she was going to the closed stool in the garderobe, but when the door closed almost soundlessly on the opposite side of the room he knew she had gone out into the corridor.

  ‘Anne?’ He raised himself on an elbow, thinking she would hear him and return. When nothing happened, he flung aside the bedclothes, stuck his feet into slippers and pulled on a robe. In the corridor, lit by a single candle-sconce, there was no sign of her. He went to look in the direction of the stairs, again without seeing her. Then he opened the doors into the Long Gallery, but that was still and silent. He looked doubtfully towards the north end of the corridor, unable to think of any reason why she should have gone that way, for the door there was little used, only giving access to the attics, the servants’ back staircase and a secluded entry into the west wing.

  Suspicion suddenly flared. Had she gone to see her relatives secretly? He had interpreted Dr Broadcourt’s advice about cosseting by keeping Anne on her own in the east wing if not in his company. It was his duty to see that nobody tired her and since it distressed her if Katherine was poorly, which the old woman was most of the time now, he had forbidden any further visits to the west wing. ‘The welfare of our unborn son must come before the old and senile,’ he had said, full of hatred for all those who had been part of her life before her marriage to him.

  Now he truly believed she had found a way to defy his will. He rushed to the far door and flung it wide as he charged through. The glow of a single candle, which she must have paused to light somewhere, illuminated her like a pale wraith halfway along the narrow passageway. She was almost level with the attic stairs and, to his mind, bound for the west wing.

  ‘Wait!’ His strong voice burst upon the silence like a cannon’s roar to echo and re-echo against the panelled walls. She gave one terrified look over her shoulder, the candle dropping from her nerveless fingers to the floor, snuffing out the flame. Then she bolted past the attic flight to the sconce-lit servants’ stairway.

  Her one thought was to lead him far from her attic room. She felt like a mother bird fluttering ahead of a predacious enemy to divert notice away from its young. Down the winding stairs she flew, handfuls of her nightgown grabbed up to leave her feet unhampered, her damask silk robe billowing out behind her. She knew he was pounding along in her wake and she could think of only one place where she could be safe from him. And Robert would be there! Hiding from the Roundheads on a secret visit home, while she, fleeing from the same danger, was on her way to share his sanctuary, his arms and his love!

  She took the last tread of the flight in the kitchen regions. On she ran, losing a slipper while the flagged floor of that part of the house struck icy cold to her feet. Then through one door and another into the entrance hall and across to the Great Hall. She could hear the Roundhead close behind her. She dodged the long oaken table and rushed into the adjoining room, breath tearing from her lungs. The dividing wall was in its socket and she had no obstruction
in her way as she threw herself towards the Queen’s Door. Her hand was shaking violently as she slid it sideways and darted through into the darkness beyond. She was safe! Swinging round, she slid the door back into place and it had almost closed when to her horror her pursuer’s foot slammed down in the remaining aperture. She set her weight on the handle inside the door, hoping the pain would make him withdraw, but his big hand, with a far greater strength behind it, began forcing it back.

  ‘Robert!’ she screamed, knowing he would rush to her assistance, but in the same instance there came a sword-thrust of pain up through her body that knocked her to the floor.

  *

  Anne did not lose her baby, although for a while it seemed she would. She had forgotten her midnight flight through the house and Makepeace did not remind her. When the danger of a miscarriage was past another physician was summoned from London, Makepeace not wanting to see Dr Broadcourt again. Complete rest was advised, which meant that Anne was destined to be practically bedridden for the rest of her pregnancy. She became like Katherine in sitting by the open windows of the master bedchamber whenever the weather allowed and was not permitted to leave it for any reason whatever. Although the baby was vigorous in her womb, she became pale and weak, missing the comfort of her embroidery, but conditioned to not stitching away from the attic. There were times on her own when she pretended she held a needle and thread and a ribbon to be embroidered and went through the actions, but it was not the same, for concentration eluded her and before long her hands fell listlessly into her lap.

  Her face lit up whenever Julia and Mary came to spend the time allotted to them by Makepeace, and she admired and handled lovingly the baby clothes they brought to show her as if the infant were already in them. There were caps, coats, nightwear and jerkins all in softest linen so fine as to be almost transparent. Everything was white with smocking and the most delicate designs in coral stitch and in thousands of French knots, which formed whirls in patterns so closely and minutely worked they almost appeared to be printed. There were tiny mittens of the same soft linen that lacked fingers but had a thumb for protection during sucking, and were similarly embroidered around the wrists. Anne had saved the robes that Michael and Julia had worn and these were re-laundered to their original snowy whiteness to be laid away in readiness with the rest of the layette.

  Her mother-in-law also came once to see her. Four man-servants bore Katherine in her marriage chair across to the east wing. They carried her as steadily as they could, but each slight jerk sent daggers through her permanently painful joints. The short ride exhausted her and she could only reply faintly to Anne’s appreciation that she had come.

  ‘I wanted to see you so much, dear Anne,’ she gasped, close to collapse. Take good care of yourself. I fear I’ll not be able to come again.’

  ‘At least we have seen each other,’ Anne replied gently. ‘My first walk after the birth shall be to carry my baby to see you.’

  It was that same night that Anne’s yearning to get back to her attic room overcame her. She went unsteadily, propping herself against the wall as far as the attic stairs. When she was halfway up the flight her strength gave out and she sank down to lie weeping across them. It was a while before she was rested enough to get back to the master bedchamber and then she had to crawl the last few yards. Fortunately the man who thought he was her husband had removed himself to the other room at the time of her threatened miscarriage and there was nobody to see her struggling to get back in to bed.

  Makepeace had waited a considerable while before investigating the Queen’s Door and then at an hour when he was sure to be unobserved. It had astonished him to see Anne disappearing through the secret door, having been certain there was no such place in this house, for he knew there had been two Roundhead raids, which were usually of exceptional thoroughness, and he himself had searched well. He nodded appreciation of the craftsmanship when he opened the panel, seeing that the sliding door, made on the same principle as the dividing wall, was four times the width of the aperture with another behind it that operated at the same time and prevented any hollow ring.

  With a lantern he conducted a preliminary investigation of the underground quarters and was surprised a second time to raise what he thought to be a trap door but which turned out to be a section of the octagonal seat in the maze. He then returned to the underground chamber to examine everything there. The weaponry interested him and he handled every piece. Some of the musketry belonged to the time of Queen Elizabeth, while the rest included snaphaunce and flintlock guns as well as wheelhock holster pistols such as had been used in the Civil War. There was a locked chest that he did not attempt to open, but when he tilted it to try to discover its contents, there was the unmistakable rattle of coins. He left everything as he had found it and gave no indication to anyone that he now knew the Sotherleigh secret way.

  His patience with Anne was wearing thin. Increasingly he was irritated by the glazed look she turned on him and at times she seemed confused as to who he was. Yet she would also answer him quite sensibly at times if it was anything connected with the baby or those in the west wing. The main trouble was that he could not find it in himself to forgive her for the mad chase she had led him down to that hidden door. His great fear had been that she would fall and he had shouted to her to stop, to take care and to think of the baby, but it was as if she had become completely deaf. Then to hear her shriek for her late husband for protection against him had chilled his blood. Since then he had found it impossible to feel the same about her, not just for using the name of his predecessor, but for disobeying him by being on her way to the west wing and then in her guilt giving no consideration to the safety of his precious unborn offspring. During the twenty-four hours when she had bled and a miscarriage seemed inevitable, he knew his love for her was being tested and found wanting. His thoughts were only for the baby, with concern for his wife only secondary. If there should be any complications at the birth through her irresponsible behaviour on that night he would have no hesitation in wanting the child saved before the mother. Wives could be replaced, but not a son and heir.

  Otherwise he had little to worry him. He had known some concern when Richard Cromwell had resigned, wondering what the outcome would be, but an orderly state of affairs prevailed throughout the country. Although there were some gentlemen who had never again accepted his invitations to Sotherleigh after Julia had brought his being a regicide into the open, there were plenty of others who came. Among those with a like mind to his, he had had many a laugh over the short-lived Cavalier rejoicing on the other side of the Channel after Tumbledown Dick’s resignation. The Royalist uprising that had been expected in England had failed to take place. To add to the joke, Charles Stuart had moved to Calais with his regiment of Guards in readiness to cross the Channel and then had had to return to Bruges when no foreign military support was forthcoming.

  *

  Julia saw Adam often. She had noted his intervention the evening her mother had appeared in the Elizabethan gown. It had spared Anne being hustled away by Makepeace and she had marked it up in his favour. He refrained from asking her to go riding again until the apple blossom had left the trees and lilac was in full flower. Then he included Mary and the result was an enjoyable outing, Julia finding that the presence of an amiable third person eliminated all strain between Adam and herself.

  She had decided it was time to present him to Katherine, whom she had told long since of his attempt to intervene in the sequestration of Sotherleigh, although not his main reason. It would not be tactful or kind to let Katherine know that some long-held secret of her romantic association with Sir Harry was now known to his grandson and her granddaughter. Katherine, able to tell that Julia could still be quite irritable about him, had not requested a meeting, but her curiosity was keen, mostly because she wanted to know if he bore any facial resemblance to his grandfather.

  When the day of the meeting came, she wore the new ruby-red gown that Mary had made her o
ut of the Lyonnaise silk and felt quite excited by this link with the past. Then at first sight of him she was disappointed, not that he was not a most striking young man, but because he was so much younger than Harry had been when she had loved him. Nevertheless, the black eyes were the same, the strong build and the voice brought back memories and there was something else vaguely familiar she could not place immediately.

  ‘You followed in your grandfather’s footsteps by being a good friend to us here at Sotherleigh as far as you were able,’ she said after they had conversed for a short while on other topics.

  ‘I only wish I could have kept the house in Pallister hands.’

  ‘You did your best and that is what counts.’ It had come to her who he was mainly like; in the portrait gallery at Warrender Hall there was a painting of one of his ancestors, who had been at court in Henry VIII s time. The same dark and handsome countenance, the fierce eyes and the broad shoulders. She had been familiar with that gallery when she and Harry had been in love. At balls and parties when they could slip away for a while without being missed, they had met in one of the alcoves there and given way to the passion that possessed them. But it was no time to recall that now.

  Neither would she mention the betrothal that Makepeace had agreed on between these two sitting with her. She liked Adam. He talked to her respectfully, but without making her feel a thousand years old, which was often the fault of those of his age and younger. She felt they would have got on well together if only Julia had given them the chance by relenting towards him. It was not that she thought him a better man than Christopher but one far more attuned to the ways of women. He knew Julia had still to be won and he was after her, his hunter’s instincts high.

  ‘I only wish it were possible for you to visit the Hall again,’ Adam was saying. ‘I’ve heard tell of a Guy Fawkes night when the bonfire flared up out of hand in a high wind and set the stables alight. Were you there?’