Lady of Hay

by Barbara Erskine

  As the door closed behind him Jo stared at the sketches he had put into her hand. She felt numb. It was all reduced to a stupid, cheap joke. John. Handsome, powerful, malicious John, pilloried by a tatty TV advertisement; reduced to a trite little sketch, to be screened between Coronation Street and the evening quiz show. She shivered unhappily as she put them down.

  Nick was back in ten minutes with a bottle of gin, four bottles of tonic, and a carafe of chianti.

  Jo let him in silently.

  “I take it you don’t like the idea?” He glanced at her as he produced a lemon from the pocket of his jacket. “Is there any ice?”

  She nodded. “It just seems rather…small.”

  “Jo, Mike has laid it on the line. He wants this idea or out. Our boys think it will work. It’s an amusing script even for the people, if there are any, who don’t know what the hell we’re talking about. If I veto it, we lose the account.”

  “Then it must go on.”

  “Is it any worse than what you propose to do with your articles and your book?” He took her hands gently.

  Jo shook her head.

  He gave a small smile. “Jo, don’t you think it’s what we need? To send ourselves up a little bit? Humor is an awfully good anodyne.”

  “I know. It’s just…”

  “I know what it is, Jo.” Releasing her, Nick turned toward the kitchen. “I’ve been there, remember?” He changed the subject abruptly. “Are you going to come to New York with me—” He broke off with a curse as, behind them, the phone rang. Swinging back into the room, he picked it up.

  “Hello?” There was complete silence on the other end of the line. They both heard the connection go dead.

  Nick slammed down the receiver.

  “Wrong number,” he said cheerfully. “Now, where was I?” He put his hands gently on Jo’s shoulders. “Well, will you come?”

  She nodded slowly. “Yes.” She moved back slightly. “Will we ever be able to forget all this, Nick?”

  He turned away and, picking up the bottles, led the way into the kitchen. “In time it will distance itself like a bad dream, I expect. I hope.” He gave his boyish smile. “Till then we must just make sure nothing else happens—apart from the happy ending.”

  They ate their supper in silence, neither suggesting they turn on any music, watching the light fade in the room as darkness came.

  The phone rang again. After a moment Nick stretched across and lifted the receiver. Once again, when he spoke the line went dead. “It’s Sam,” Jo whispered into the silence. He sat back, not looking at her, his eyes on the open French doors onto the balcony. The streetlights gave a pale, false moonlit wash to the stone of the balustrade. He did not dare move. He did not dare even think about her. Suddenly danger crackled in the atmosphere between them, held at bay only by the quiet.

  Then it was gone. Nick turned and looked at Jo covertly. She was sitting uncomfortably, drawn to the edge of her chair by the urgency of the phone bell, her shoulders tense, the angle of her head defiant as she stared past him, as if she were listening to something far away inside herself.

  Nick was suddenly galvanized into movement. “Jo! Jo, for Christ’s sake, don’t do it! Jo!” He caught her shoulders and shook her hard. “Jo, can you hear me?”

  Her hands had come up automatically and she clutched convulsively at his shirt front. “Nick—”

  “Hold on, Jo. Don’t let it happen. Fight it, Jo. Fight it!”

  She let go of him abruptly and clapped her hands to her head.

  The blackness was whirling around her; there was a roaring in her ears, waves of sound annihilating her, like torrents of angry water toppling over onto a beach. There were chains on her wrists and rain, rain in the shadows, rain in the wind howling around her, tearing at the huge red-and-gold standard with the clawing leopards of England as it strained high in the darkness, tearing her clothes, and above all the sound of thunder. But Nick was still beside her. She could see his mouth moving. He was talking to her, his hands outstretched to hold her. It was Nick…Nick…

  The telephone bell cut through the sound, echoing in the room for the third time that night. Neither of them took any notice of it. To Nick it echoed obscenely in the silence, for Jo it drove the whirling noise away. As suddenly as the dislocation had come, it passed, leaving her shaking like a leaf.

  She collapsed into Nick’s arms, tears pouring down her face. “It wanted to happen again, Nick. I was at the castle at Carrickfergus. You were there too…”

  “But you fought it, love.” He gathered her tightly against his chest. “You fought it.” Behind them the phone fell silent. “It won’t happen again. You know now you can fight it. You can. It’s all right, Jo. It’s all right. You’re safe.”

  She was still clinging to him desperately. “Don’t go, don’t leave me—”

  “I won’t leave you, Jo.” He smiled down at her reassuringly. “Come on. It’s all over now. You’re safe.”

  “Make love to me, Nick.”

  He tensed slightly. “You know I want to, but—Jo, I have my own demons to fight too. I’m afraid of what I might do.”

  She was shaking her head, still clinging to his neck. “You won’t hurt me, Nick. You won’t. Just make love to me. Make me part of you. Please. You have to—” Her voice rose suddenly. “Please, Nick. Now. Here.”

  “No, Jo.” Gently he held her away from him. “Not here.”

  He led her through into her bedroom and, closing the curtains, turned on the bedside light. She was standing quite still, looking at the floor. Her shaking had stopped. He put his hands on her shoulders. “You’re sure this is what you want?”

  She nodded. “Undress me, Nick.”

  He frowned. She was standing before him completely submissive, no longer hysterical, not moving as he raised his hand tentatively to the zipper at the back of her dress. The soft red silk slid to the floor. Beneath it she wore nothing but a black lace slip. He pulled the straps down over her shoulders and the slip followed the dress, leaving her quite naked. Keeping an iron control over himself, Nick led her gently to the bed and pulled back the covers, watching as obediently she turned to climb in. Across her shoulders was a fading welt, the mark of Sam’s belt. At the sight of them Nick felt a wave of blind fury sweep over him. For a moment he did not move. He clenched his fists, feeling the icy drench of perspiration across his shoulders as he closed his eyes.

  “Nick?” He heard Jo’s whisper from the bed.

  She had pulled the sheet over herself and was staring at him. He could see the sudden fear behind her eyes.

  He forced himself to smile. “It’s okay, Jo.” He sat down beside her. “It’s not you. I just had this tremendous urge to kill my brother.” He touched her face gently, then slowly he began to unbutton his shirt. “I won’t hurt you, Jo. I promise.” He reached out to turn off the lamp. Then he pulled her into his arms.

  ***

  She slept lightly, waking twice in the night to reassure herself that Nick was still there, snuggling against his warm, relaxed body before drifting back into a restless, dream-haunted sleep. Once she cried out and Nick turned to her without waking and held her close against him. They both woke early. Jo was pale and there were dark rings under her eyes as she made their coffee and toast while he was shaving. He glanced at her once or twice as they had their breakfast, concerned at her unnatural quietness.

  “Jo, are you all right?” he asked at last.

  She nodded. “Tired, that’s all. I didn’t sleep very well.”

  He smiled. “Not my fault, I hope.”

  “No, not your fault.” She made herself smile back over her coffee cup. “Nick, Ceecliff took my car. If you don’t need yours, would you lend it to me this morning?”

  He glanced at her sharply. She was taut as a wire again, her knuckles white on the handle of her cup.

  “Of course you can borrow it.” He reached into his pocket for the keys. “Where do you want to go?”

  “I’ve got
one or two things to do.” She made a visible effort to pull herself together. “I’ve been away so much. If I’m going to Suffolk tomorrow, I must get some things sorted out today.”

  “Okay.” He finished his toast, drained his coffee, and stood up. “I’ll call you later. If you’re very good, there might even be a glass of champagne for you at the office this evening.” He paused as he was about to put on his jacket. “Do you want me to come back here this evening?”

  “You know I do.” She stood up and reached up to kiss him. “I want you to come back here always, Nick.”

  ***

  As soon as he left she showered and dressed in a blue linen skirt and blouse. She straightened the apartment, put her camera and notebook in her bag, and picked up the keys to the Porsche. Then she hesitated. She looked at the pile of books on the table.

  She knew what she had to do. She had to find out where Matilda had died. No more trances, no more hypnotism. Just plain fact, to finish the story off. When she got there she would know. She opened the notebook and stood staring down at the scribbled lines of writing; notes taken so many weeks ago, which had meant so little then. Now they were a shorthand mockery of a lifetime of love and hate and hope and fear.

  She ran her finger down the page. “Matilda and her son were sent from Bristol to a dungeon at Windsor”…Windsor or Corfe. She gazed across the room unseeing. Windsor or Corfe. She would know at once. She would feel Matilda’s fear. That would be enough. There would be no last trance; no more. Just the final stark sentence in her story.

  She closed the notebook resolutely and, picking up her bag, let herself out of the apartment.

  The Porsche ate up the miles to Windsor, streaking down the fast lane of the M4 without regard to the speed limit. From far away the huge towers of the castle showed from the road, shimmering in the haze that hung over the willow-lined water meadows which bordered the Thames. Jo swung the car into the old town and parked it in a side street below the massive castle walls. For a moment she did not move. She rested her forehead against the steering wheel and closed her eyes, trying to steady the uneasy pounding of the pulse beneath her ribs. Then, taking a deep breath, she swung the car door open and pulled herself out. The town was very crowded and she was jostled back and forth on the pavement as she made her way resolutely toward the gatehouse at the entrance to the castle.

  The lower ward was thronged with people. Gray stone; walls; towers; the flying buttresses of St. George’s Chapel; emerald grass, clipped as if by nail scissors. Up toward the hill on which stood the huge round tower. Cameras; children; everywhere people staring; people laughing; people talking; people only superficially aware of the ghosts that walked around them. Hitching her bag up higher onto her shoulder, Jo stared up at the vast bulge of the gray walls. High above, rippling from the flagpole, was a flag. She felt her stomach tighten as she stared up, half expecting to see again the snarling leopards of John’s standard against the stormy sky. Her mind made a tentative shadowy probe toward the dream, rejected it, and drew back. It was not John’s standard. She could see the brash red, white, and blue now of the Union Jack with, behind it, wisps of high summer cloud and sunlight.

  Slowly her hands unclenched in the pockets of her skin as she walked around the castle perimeter, expecting nothing now, the moment past, the ancient stones absolved of her particular nightmare.

  It was after five when she got home. She threw down the keys on the table and went straight to the phone.

  “Jane? Is Nick there? It’s Jo.”

  Over the line she could hear the sound of laughter from the office. Suddenly she felt cut off and very lonely.

  Jane came back on the line in seconds. “Sorry, Jo. You’ve just missed him, but he was only going to the apartment. You’ll catch him there.”

  Jo sat still for a moment feeling strangely let down. He had promised to return to her. She wanted to tell him what she had done. She wanted to tell him what had happened.

  She leaned forward slowly and flipped her notebook open. “Matilda and her son were sent to a dungeon at Windsor…” Jo picked up her pen and crossed out Windsor and wrote Corfe.

  Half an hour later she redialed Nick’s number. It rang for several seconds before it was picked up.

  “Hello?” It was not Nick’s voice that answered.

  Jo felt herself tense nervously. The receiver slipped slightly in her hand as perspiration started out all over her palm.

  “Sam?” Her voice was husky.

  “Hello, Jo. How are you?”

  She couldn’t reply for a moment. Neither could she put down the phone.

  “I thought you’d gone back to Scotland,” she managed to say at last.

  “I’m on my way.” She could hear the amusement in his voice. “Nick and I had a long talk about things on Tuesday and we agreed that perhaps I should go home.”

  Jo found she was pressing the receiver closer and closer against her ear. “I want to talk to Nick.”

  “He’s not back yet, but I’m expecting him any second.” His voice was very calm.

  “I see. Look, Sam, I’ll call back in a few minutes.”

  “There’s no need, Jo,” he said slowly. “He’ll be back very soon. Talk to me instead.”

  “I don’t want to, Sam,” she replied in a panic.

  “You do want to. You’ve been wanting to speak to me for days; you’ve been needing to speak to me, Jo.” His voice sunk a semitone. “That was why you called, because you realized how much you needed to see me, because of your headaches, Jo. I want you to listen to me very carefully now. Can you hear me, Jo?” He paused for a second. “When you speak to Nicholas he is going to ask you to come to his office party. You are going to tell him you are too tired. You have a headache and you don’t want to see him. You don’t want to see him at all tonight, do you, Jo? You are going to sit down quietly at home and watch television, and later this evening I shall come to you and make your headache better. You do have a headache, don’t you, Jo?”

  “Yes.” Her whispered answer was barely audible.

  “Then you need me, Jo.”

  She stared at the phone for several minutes after she had hung up, a puzzled frown on her face. Why had she talked to him? Why had she listened to him for even a single second? She never wanted to see Sam again, and yet it was true, she did have a headache. It would do no harm, surely, if he came, just for a few minutes, to help her relax…

  When Nick called her she was firm and slightly distant. Her headache was worse, like a blinding ligature around her eyes, throbbing incessantly as she tried to focus her thoughts. “I’ll be all right, Nick, really. I just need an early night.” She hadn’t congratulated him on the signing of the contracts with Mike Desmond. That was the reason for the party. She groped for the right words, painfully conscious that the room was beginning to spin.

  “You are sure you’ll be okay?” His voice came from far away. “Jo, I’ll look in later. If you’re asleep I won’t disturb you. Take care, my darling…” Darling. He had never called her that before. Smiling in spite of her pain, Jo felt her way almost blindly to the television and turned it on, then she sank onto the sofa in front of it and sat back, her eyes closed, letting the waves of crushing agony beat one by one against the back of her eyelids.

  ***

  Sam came sometime after seven, inserting in the lock of the street door a shiny, newly cut key. It stuck slightly, then it turned and the heavy door swung open. The second key fitted perfectly. He held his breath slightly as he turned it, wondering if she had bolted the door, but it swung open silently and admitted him to the quiet apartment.

  He listened. Yes, the TV was on softly, as he had known it would be. After closing the door carefully he slid the bolt home and slotted in the chain. Then he turned into the living room and stood looking down at Jo. She was lying back against the cushions on the sofa, her face white, her eyes closed, oblivious of the violent fistfight between two men going on on the screen before her. Her body was taut with p
ain.

  “Hello, Jo.” Quietly he walked into the room.

  She opened her eyes wearily and gave him a faint smile. There was a quick shiver of apprehension, then it was gone. “Are you going to make my headache better?”

  Sam nodded. He stood between her and the TV. “You know what I’m going to have to do, Jo.”

  “You’re going to hypnotize me again.”

  Sam smiled. “Isn’t that what you want?”

  She nodded slowly. “But I don’t want to go back into the past, Sam. I don’t want to regress any more…”

  She wanted to stand up, but her limbs were too heavy. They would not obey her. She looked up at him helplessly.

  “Were you really William?” she asked slowly. “Or did you just choose him?”

  Was there a hint of a smile behind his eyes? Sam was feeling in his pocket. He produced a cassette and, moving across to the stereo, he inserted it into the player. The soft strains of the flute cut across the muted wail of a police siren on the screen in the corner.

  “We do not choose our destinies, Joanna. They are given to us,” he said. He folded his arms. “It’s time to take you back. You shake your head. Poor Jo. You are already halfway there. You hear the music? You cannot resist the music, Jo. It takes you into the past. It takes you back to John. It takes you back to the king who has ordered you to be shackled like a common criminal and brought before him on your knees…”

  38

  John was sitting by the fire in one of the side chambers above the hall when the prisoners, still ragged and damp from the sea and the rain, were brought before him.

  He turned in his chair without comment as the three women and Will, reunited at last, stood before him and their guards fell back. Matilda raised her head and looked the king full in the eye for a moment, then proudly, without lowering her head, she knelt before him. The others followed suit, and she could hear, with a sudden snap of irritation, that Mattie had begun to sniff again. No one spoke.