Читать книгу Child of the Phoenix - Barbara Erskine - Страница 66

Three days later young Robert Bruce was lying in wait for Eleyne in the stables.

‘I’m going riding with you,’ he said as soon as he spotted her. ‘Mama says you ride a great stallion.’

Eleyne felt her heart sink. She did not want this boy to ride Invictus. She did not even want him to see the horse. Dragging her feet, she walked towards Robert and gave him a determined brittle smile.

‘He’s cast a shoe,’ she lied. ‘If we ride we’ll ride Sable and Silver.’ The two mares were matched for height and speed, both well mannered and willing. She eyed her companion cautiously. She was two inches taller, but he was sturdier by far. They would probably be well matched in the saddle; but he would be heavier which would give her the advantage.

He caught her sizing him up and grinned. ‘Do you know why we’ve come here?’ he asked, his tone deceptively friendly.

Instinctively she knew she shouldn’t rise to the question, but, as instinctively, she knew she would have to ask it.

‘Why?’

He moved closer and lowered his voice confidentially. ‘I saw the letter Uncle John sent mama. It said the most terrible things about you!’

‘What things?’ Stung, Eleyne felt her face growing hot.

‘Dreadful things!’ Robert crowed. He stepped back, ready to run if necessary.

‘I don’t believe you. Anyway your mother wouldn’t have shown you John’s letter.’

‘She didn’t! I sneaked it out of her writing box!’

‘That’s dishonest –’ Eleyne’s temper was beginning to flare. She stared at the boy in disbelief. Apart from Luned and Isabella, she had never had a friend her own age, and certainly not one who had taunted her like this. She didn’t know what to do, and hesitated, torn between wanting to run away and wanting to know what the letter said.

‘I don’t suppose you can even read properly,’ she said scornfully.

The barb went home. ‘Of course I can,’ he retorted at once. ‘It said you were a strange, haunted child!’ He stuck out his tongue at her. ‘It said you saw ghosts in every shadow and that your nurse was a witch.’ He danced away a few steps, tempting her to chase him. ‘It said you were weird!’

‘I’m not!’ She was furious.

‘You are. You see ghosts.’

‘So what? Can’t you?’ She went on to the attack.

Her change of mood took him aback. He frowned, then reluctantly shook his head.

She sensed triumph: ‘You would be scared out of your mind if you saw one.’

‘I wouldn’t.’ It was his turn to be on the defensive.

‘You would.’

‘Wouldn’t!’

‘All right then. Prove it.’ Caution was thrown to the winds. ‘I’ll take you to a room where I saw a ghost.’

Robert hesitated for a fraction of a second, then he nodded. ‘Go on then.’

‘What about riding?’ Eleyne smiled, daring him to take the escape route. He shook his head firmly. ‘Later,’ he said.

Both had forgotten that she was Countess of Huntingdon and mistress of the castle. It was as two truant children that they dodged out of sight of the stables and raced across the courtyard towards the keep, sliding with the invisibility only children can manage across the lower chamber and up the dark stairs towards Lord Albemarle’s bedroom. At the top of the stairs they stopped, panting.

‘It was in here,’ Eleyne whispered. The sun was on the far side of the keep this time and the room was in shadow.

Robert peered past her. ‘What did it look like?’ he hissed.

She smiled. ‘Just a lady. A very beautiful lady in strange black clothes. She had lace here round her face,’ she gestured with her hands, ‘and a veil.’

‘Did she say anything?’

Eleyne shook her head.

‘She doesn’t sound very frightening,’ Robert scoffed.

Eleyne frowned. ‘She wasn’t frightening exactly,’ she said. It was hard to describe the feelings she experienced when she saw these figures who slipped through the fine gauze curtain which was time and then slipped away again. She surveyed the room, then tiptoed through the rounded stone arch. ‘Come on,’ she said quietly. ‘I was in the little chapel through here.’ She gestured towards the doorway in the far wall. ‘Then I looked back and saw her there, by the window.’

She crept into the oratory, Robert close at her heels. The tiny chapel was very dark. Both children held their breath as they stared round.

‘Can you smell anything strange?’ Eleyne whispered, her mouth very close to Robert’s ear.

He swallowed nervously and gave a cautious sniff. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘Incense,’ she murmured. ‘When she came there was a smell of incense.’

Robert felt the hairs standing up on the back of his neck; he wished they had gone riding instead. ‘I can’t smell anything.’ His eyes swivelled round in his skull as he tried not to move his head. ‘There’s nothing here. Let’s go.’

‘No. Wait.’ Eleyne could smell it. The rich exotic fragrance drifted imperceptibly in the still air of the oratory. ‘She’s here,’ she breathed.

Robert stepped back and felt the rough stones of the wall cold through his tunic. His mouth had gone dry. Nervously, he turned his head so that he could see through the arch towards the window. There was nothing there. He frowned, staring harder, following her gaze, his hands wet with perspiration.

‘Can you see her?’ Eleyne asked softly. There was nothing there and the scent such as it was had gone. She glanced at him. He was shaking his head, his eyes screwed up with the effort of trying to see. His face was pasty.

‘It’s not the lady of Fotheringhay,’ she said very quietly. ‘Do you see? It’s huge. And ugly. So ugly!’

Robert’s face went whiter. He was pressing hard against the wall, wishing the stones would swallow him up.

‘I can’t see anything,’ he gulped. ‘I can’t see anything at all.’ He looked at her in mute appeal, then he stared. Her face had lit with suppressed laughter and she was giggling. ‘If you could see your face, Nephew Robert,’ she scolded.

‘There’s nothing there,’ he said slowly. The fear and awe on his face vanished. ‘There’s nothing there at all! You’ve been teasing me! Why you – ’

With a little shriek of laughter she dived past him. She raced across the empty bedchamber and pelted down the long spiral stairs, round and round and round, with Robert hot on her heels, bursting into the shadowy lower chamber just as John’s steward appeared at an inner doorway. He stared at Eleyne as she stopped in her tracks, noticing with amused approval the flushed face and rumpled veil. ‘Good day, my lady,’ he said with a bow. ‘His lordship was looking for you in the great hall.’ His gaze strayed to the boy behind her and he hid a smile. ‘It’s good to see you again, Master Robert.’

Robert grinned impudently: ‘And you, Master Steward.’ He turned to Eleyne and bowed in turn. ‘We mustn’t keep Uncle John waiting, Aunt Eleyne,’ he said severely. Then he winked. ‘I’ll race you!’

Eleyne hesitated for only a second, but already he was across the floor, scattering the scented woodruff which covered it, and out through the main door and out of sight.