The Vizard Mask

by Diana Norman

  She had regained her Priory. She should have had the drawbridge chains repaired so that she could shut out Jeffreys's brutish world for ever. As it was, she bolted the gatehouse before she did a circuit of the house to make sure Nevis had left nobody behind. The topiary chessmen had retained some of the heat of the day and exuded the sweet smell of yew; the tobacco flowers Rupert had imported from the Americas to remind her of Massachusetts came into their own at night and added to the scent of roses and lavender and bruised grass.

  A white shape was peering out from behind one of the chessmen. She made herself run at it — and found it was a pair of drawers. Sir Nicholas's. Further on she stumbled over a snake and gasped. But it was the dildo.

  She had disturbed a bird; she heard a rustling in the bushes down by the moat, and found herself hurrying. She shut the terrace doors of Rupert's study and locked them, then walked quickly round the rest of the house until she'd regained the courtyard. It was dark, the major-domo had removed all the candles he'd brought and lit none of hers. The moon was still high, but under the shadow of the eaves she had to feel for the lock on the doors of the two wings and try a couple of keys from her chatelaine before she turned them. She had left the doors unlocked on purpose — it showed she had nothing to hide.

  She groped her way in through the hall door, locked it behind her and ran her left hand along the screen until it touched the newel post of the stairs. Her high heels clacked loudly into the silence of the house and the top rise of the stairs creaked, as it always did. She put her feet more carefully in obedience with the growing instinct to keep everything quiet.

  Unusually, her hall was hot — the major-domo had insisted on lighting the fire - and smelled of meat, tobacco and scented resin. Moonlight curved over her feet as she stepped through its reflection on the floor to open one of the lights and let in the night air. She stood at the window looking over Sedgemoor, wondering how Benedick would feel crossing the moor where so many comrades lay buried. Make sure you don't join them, my son.

  A barn owl flapped past on white, lazy wings, causing her to start back, and behind her the gargoyle screamed.

  It kept on screaming as she hared along the passage to her room, threw herself on the bed and ran her fingers over the bedhead searching for Eve's nipple.

  There was a flickering light when the panel drew back and she could hear movement. 'Henry? What's the matter?'

  'Your bloody uncle or whatever he is, that's who's the matter.'

  She could see into the room now. A rushlight stood on the floor near Martin Hughes's bed. Martin himself had hunched himself into a corner and was uttering monotonous screams, his eyes bulging as he stared at what Penitence had to admit, if you'd just woken up, would be a shock. In an up-thrown light the Viscount looked a tall demon from Hell. She wriggled into the hole, seized the rushlight, emerged with it and lit one of her bedroom candles. With its aid she found a pot of lanolin grease and some lamb's-wool which she took back with the rushlight and handed in to the Viscount. 'It's all right,' she said soothingly to her great-uncle. 'He was disguised. You're safe now, thanks to him. We'll get you away soon.'

  'Did the boy get away?' Henry scrubbed lampblack off his face.

  'He got away from here. Oh, Henry, there's such a long way for him to go.'

  'He's got Muskett. Muskett'll see him through.'

  'Yes. I miss Muskett.' She'd become dependent on the man.

  'He'll be back. He'll see the boy on to the yacht and then he'll come back for me.'

  'But when you go back to Bridgwater they'll know you hadn't made the return journey. They'll have only seen Muskett riding back.'

  'Good God, woman, where's your faith in the English militia? For one thing they're too bloody inefficient to know I haven't already slipped by them. For another, they'll have changed the sentries. The morning duty will think I came back for more you-know-what the same night. Which,' he winked at her — he'd recovered his poise - 'is not a bad idea.' He finished wiping the lampblack of his face, and turned to Martin Hughes, whose screams had subsided to a chesty wheeze. Henry poured him a beaker of water from the ewer and held it to the old man's mouth. 'Look well on me, Master Hughes. I am to be your great-nephew-in-law. God help me.'

  'Shshh,' Penitence begged him. 'Keep your voice down.'

  'Why? Didn't you check the house? I heard them all go.'

  'I don't know why, just keep your voice down.'

  'Is there any food left? We'd better get this poor old sod fed.' He was pleased with himself. She'd seen similiar euphoria in Hart and Lacy and Kynaston after a good performance. Known it herself, for that matter.

  She had to force herself down to the kitchen. Never before had she felt afraid of the house, but her recent guests had left it menacing and alien.

  Jeffreys's cooks had been charitable enough to leave some scraps and she took them, with a jug of wine, back to the bedroom where Henry had got the old man out of the panel door and laid him on the bed, gently talking to him to reassure him after his fright. From the way Martin fell on the food it was obvious he was better. With a shock, Penitence realized she had fed neither him nor Benedick all day. It seemed dreadful to her that she'd sent her son into such danger on an empty belly.

  'And I got Jeffreys off your back, didn't I?' Henry was still triumphant. 'Or off your front — whatever the bastard's preference.'

  'You did.' He had no idea. Jeffreys would hate her for the rest of his life. And you can't have too few enemies in that class.

  Why didn't Rupert marry you?' Henry asked idly. 'Left it to me to make an honest woman of you, I expect.' He stretched. Well, tomorrow we'll go to my place and get married in the chapel.'

  She knew she should keep her mouth shut — they were both too tired for argument — but even in this predicament she could not leave him deceived. 'I can't marry you, Henry.'

  What?' That he would be refused hadn't occurred to him.

  'I promised Rupert I would never marry. He was dying.'

  'And now he's dead. For God's sake, Boots, you were hardly the bride of Christ. He wouldn't marry you: I will. It's a good offer.'

  He sounded so aggrieved she almost laughed, but his mouth was thinning into the line it took when he almost hated her. She pleaded: 'Henry, Rupert gave me everything. What difference does it make? You know I'll be honoured to be your mistress.'

  He got off the bed, grabbed her arm and hurried her to the window; he couldn't bear that even such as Martin Hughes should hear her talk like that. Until that moment she hadn't seen how conventional was the core under the unconventional exterior. Perhaps, she thought, it's all of a piece. He defied everything his father stood for by marrying a Catholic, by becoming an actor, by choosing to serve his country as an agent rather than the more usual politician or soldier. But equally he was the opposite of his promiscuous father in believing firmly in the honourable estate of marriage. And both your choices have been a disappointment: the late Lady Torrington, now me. She knew what it must have taken for him to fight down all his suspicion and jealousy and offer to marry her. It made her love him more, even while she was irritated. He could have asked nicely.

  At the window, he shook her. 'Will you stop thinking like a trollop? I want legitimate heirs.'

  Nobody could move her to anger quicker than he could. 'Is that your reason for marrying?'

  'It's the usual one.'

  Below them moonlight flooded the courtyard, reducing the shadows of the flower pots and the mounting block to dark pools around their bases.

  'For God's sake,' Henry was saying, 'Rupert had no right to demand such a thing. He didn't marry you himself.'

  'He would have,' she said sharply. How dare he attack Rupert. 'But he couldn't. And he didn't make me promise. I gave it freely.'

  'Then you're a—'

  Their voices rising, they still heard the creak in the bedroom doorway and then the voice: A fornicators' quarrel is it?'

  Nevis stood there.

  It took time for Peniten
ce to register that the man was dripping wet from his cloak to his boots and had a horse- pistol in each hand. The triumph in his eyes was awful. A lamb saw the same expression before the wolf leaped; the slavering joy of a predator about to kill. For the moment she experienced such despair that she was rocked and nearly fell, as if the world had stopped turning.

  'Major Nevis,' said the Viscount. 'How nice. Swam the moat, I see.' His voice was as steady as when he talked to Muskett.

  'But kept my powder dry.' Nevis must have put the guns in his hat; it was the only thing that wasn't wet. Its long feather gleamed. He edged to the bed and put the mouth of one of the pistols against Martin Hughes's forehead. The old man's eyes were shut and he looked, as he'd looked for days, at death's door. Nevis didn't give him a second glance. He turned his head and peered into the hole from which the rushlight inside still glimmered. 'I knew there was a secret room.'

  Penitence's hand, gripping Henry's, felt him bunch his muscles to leap across the room and attack the man, then relax as he saw it couldn't be done before the pistol fired. Thank God. He was being sensible. Nevis would kill him, and Martin Hughes too.

  'Nobody in it,' said Nevis. 'I suppose Hurd's gone?'

  Penitence said: 'Who?' She didn't know what else to say.

  Henry said: 'He didn't enjoy the company.'

  Nevis nodded. 'He was the blackamoor. You changed places. I was near half-way to Taunton when I realized. So I came back.'

  'He won't be sorry you missed him.'

  Nevis smiled. 'Neither am I. I've made a better catch. Much better. I've got Prince Rupert's doxy for one.' He switched his attention to Penitence, whom he'd largely ignored. 'You'll burn, mistress.' It gave him pleasure, but not as much as telling Henry: 'And I've got the Viscount of Severn and Thames. And you're for the block, master. I'll see you get the same executioner as Monmouth. He took five strokes of the axe and then had to finish the job with a knife.'

  She said: 'The Viscount had no part in the escape. He came back to spend the night with me, as he often does. He knew nothing of my plan to substitute my son in his place. He was in the next bedroom, waiting for me. Why would he help one of the King's rebels? He's not been concerned with the rising. He's a loyal subject.'

  She heard herself chattering on and knew that neither of the protagonists was paying her attention; she was that marginal thing, a woman. This was male territory, two stags circling, but of the two it was Nevis, the one with the advantage of a weapon, who was the challenger. She wondered how Henry could have inspired so much enmity, then she thought that it was because he had everything while Nevis, without humour, charm, or connections, survived by hating those who had.

  'Why should he help one of the King's rebels?' Nevis picked up her question to play with. He was looking at the Viscount. 'Because the rebel Hurd is his son, that's why.'

  He waited for their reaction. He got more from Penitence than the Viscount. How does he know? How could he know? He looked so ordinary yet radiated such omnipotent ill-will. The element of sorcery was added to the shadows of the room.

  'Do you know how I know?'

  She shook her head, though he wasn't looking at her.

  'A little gargoyle told me.'

  He'd been in the hall, listening. The spy-holes of the secret room worked two ways. He'd heard her and Henry talking. She tried frantically to think of what they'd said.

  'And a little letter.' He was becoming confident now, shifting to make himself comfortable on the bed. With a glance down at Martin Hughes, he put the right-hand pistol down on the table to the right of the bed and felt inside his coat. Penitence could practically feel her lover willing the old man to make a move, now, to grab his enemy's arm. She willed equally hard that he shouldn't. The other pistol was aimed without a tremor in their direction.

  Nevis had a letter in his hand. It was the one MacGregor had sent to Dorinda. After Prue had given it to her she'd kept it in a box on her dressing-table. He began to read, carefully, like a boy showing off to a favourite teacher.

  Dear Wife. The lad is determined on it. I would have told all to his unknowing father trusting him to be as inclined as ourselves to wish his son's retreat from this business of Monmouth but my lord Henry King has left the Netherlands. All the caution the boy will use is to call himself by the name of Hurd. Stay by his mother at the Priory as I shall stay by the lad when we get to England to direct him in need. We are committed to the venture now. Pray the Lord He smiles on the Duke's endeavour so that you and I be reunited in life before we are in Heaven. But as He wills. Yr loving husband, Donal MacGregor.

  He looked up. 'You're a sad slut, Mistress Hughes, you lock up nothing. I've moved around your house by day, by night. I've found keys, pistols, letters, all for the taking. And this one. It proved you Hurd's mother. I knew the bastard would come. And just now I heard a gargoyle speak in a woman's voice, I heard it call a man "Henry" and prove him Hurd's father.' He put the letter back in his coat, and the pistol once more against Martin Hughes's head. 'Old fornicators. Did Prince Rupert know his drab was employing a mere viscount to fill her twat?'

  Penitence barely heard him. She stared straight ahead, every nerve intent on the man beside her who had gone as still as death. Now you know because a man has told you so. You wouldn't believe me.

  Nevis was still trying to get a rise out of Henry. 'The King'll be interested to know one of the peers of his realm has got a son that's a Monmouth.'

  She felt Henry bring his attention back to the present. 'But you see,' he said reasonably, 'we were afraid he'd disgrace the family name and join the Lambs.'

  Oh, bless him. She saw Nevis's thumb cock the left-hand pistol. Don't shoot him. The man stayed where he was for a while. He seemed to be thinking. He laid the uncocked pistol carefully on the table. He stood up, felt above his head to the tester rail, levered himself up on the bed and kicked backwards.

  His boot heel stabbed into Martin Hughes's head. Blood spurted in the old man's grey hair. It was the most calculated, casual bit of violence Penitence had ever seen. Nevis's face didn't change: 'To keep him quiet while we go to the hall,' he said. 'Jones will come soon and we'll take you two fornicators to Taunton.'

  It was odd to hear the Puritans' much-loved denunciation 'fornicators' in the mouth of a member of a regiment renowned for its colourful cursing. It seemed to be the worst Nevis could call them. He was brought up like I was. She'd placed him. He was that most dangerous thing, a revolter against his background; he had thrown in his lot with the sinners, but could find no joy in their sinning unless it was cruel.

  The Viscount offered her his right arm and she took it. Waved on by Nevis's pistol they crossed the bedroom to the door.

  Like her, the Viscount appeared to be dwelling on his death for he suddenly shouted: 'Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.'

  'Ecclesiastes 9,' said Penitence automatically.

  'Shut your mouths. I'll not have fucking preaching, I'll not have it.' Unable to see that bland face, Penitence could hear the hysteria in Nevis's voice.

  Now Henry had switched to the Psalms. 'Length of days is in your right hand.' He'd got it wrong. It was 'length of days is in her right hand'. He had her arm pressed tight against his side and was steering her too far to the right so that she stumbled against the bedside table.

  She got a glimpse of Martin Hughes's pained, open eyes and the blood on his hair. Henry's right hand let go of her left one and jerked before taking it again.

  Nevis came behind them. The candle he was managing to carry threw the shadow of the feather in his hat on to the wall ahead of them. 'The pistol's pointing at your doxy, Captain,' he said.

  Among all the fears of what would happen, Penitence felt an unexpected and searing regret that she was to end up notorious. It seemed to her at that moment that all she'd ever wanted was respectability. Like a wood in bowls she had been thrown down life's alley as
kew; instead of a straight run she had wobbled from side to side, inevitably ricocheting from one disaster to the next. She wouldn't even die married. A doxy. Ruperta, I'm so sorry. Aphra would write a play of it. Oh God, this was one's life flashing before one's eyes.

  'Well, well,' said Henry. 'A son.' He was speaking only to her.

  Immediately she stopped drowning. It was the two of them alone in a boat. Nevis's filthy monologue behind them was the background sound of sea.

  'Why didn't you tell me?' He was aggrieved again.

  'What?

  'Right away when you knew.'

  'I didn't know where you were. How dare you reproach me.' Of all times, how could he infuriate her like this.

  'You could have made enquiries at court.'

  'We d-d-d-didn't move in c-court circles in Newgate.' Oh damn.

  The muzzle of a pistol poked into her spine so that she stiffened. 'Get into the hall.' Once in, Penitence was made to go and light the candles in the windows while Nevis kept one pistol against the Viscount's back and the other trained on her. Her hand trembled so that she could barely strike the steel. When she'd succeeded, she was told to open one of the lights 'so's we can hear Jones'. The Viscount was sent to sit down under the window next to her while Nevis stayed by the stairhead. 'There'll only be two horses, you fornicators. Mine's down by the gates. Jones has got his. You'll be taken across the moor and through Taunton on the end of fucking ropes.'