Читать книгу The House Of Allerbrook - Valerie Anand - Страница 27

It had been a bad dream. Just a bad dream, nothing more. Opening her eyes on a September dawn, Jane wondered how she could possibly have dreamed that she was married to Harry Hudd and living at Rixons Farm, no longer a Sweetwater lady entitled to spend all day on fine embroidery if she chose, but working from daybreak to nightfall and spending the night in the bed of an unprepossessing middle-aged farmer. What a silly fantasy! Of all the absurd…

She woke up fully and, not for the first time, discovered that the bad dream was real. She really was in Harry Hudd’s lumpy bed and beside her, Harry was just waking up. He opened first one watery blue eye and then the other and grinned his gap-toothed grin. “Ah. Me liddle darling. Just time afore the milkin’, eh?” he said in a throaty tone that she recognized all too well.

He rolled on top of her, groping beneath the covers. She tried, as she had often tried before, to close her eyes and pretend that this wasn’t Harry but Peter Carew, but her bedfellow, with his animal odour and his pawing and thrusting and complete absence of anything that could be described as tenderness, could not be anyone but Harry.

She could only lie there and resign herself. Fortunately, he never seemed to expect any kind of response from her, which was just as well, for she couldn’t imagine giving it.

Francis had arranged it, as she had feared he would, but all the same, Francis was not the only one to blame. Her crime was no crime in most people’s eyes, and at heart he knew it. He might never have gone through with this had it not been for Dorothy. Jane was not cruel by nature, but if Dorothy were ever arrested and taken into the depths of the Tower of London and racked, and Jane had the power to rescue her, she didn’t think she’d use it. Dorothy had blocked her way of escape. Dorothy, as much as—or perhaps more than—Francis, was responsible for this.

The shock of Dorothy’s behaviour had been all the worse because at first Francis, angry as he was, had refrained from criticizing Jane in front of other members of the household, and she had begun to think that after all, life might settle down.

She tried to be useful. She missed Eleanor badly, but at least Lisa was allowed to stay as her maid and companion, and otherwise the household was almost as it had been before she left for court. Susie, now married to the groom Tim Snowe and expecting a child, was rearing poultry at his cottage, and had been replaced by Letty, from Clicket. Letty was thin, wiry, hardworking and unlikely to marry. She had had an understanding with a lad in Clicket but he had backed out after smallpox marked her face.

“I’m the same girl now as I was afore I got pockmarked, but he were too daft to know it. I’ll never give another man the time of day as long as I live,” Letty had said when she first came to Allerbrook. Pockmarked or not, she was a good cook and as handy with a hoe or a pitchfork as any man. Jane and Letty liked each other and worked well together.

Dr. Spenlove, who had always been Jane’s friend, was still there. Spenlove openly congratulated her on her good sense in fleeing the king’s advances. Spenlove, more than anyone, might have helped to reconcile Francis to his sister’s return home.

But then Thomas and Mary Stone, who had been away in Kent, reappeared, opened Clicket Hall, announced that Dorothy was coming home from court to be formally betrothed to Ralph Palmer and issued invitations to a celebration dinner in June.

That betrothal dinner also featured from time to time in Jane’s dreams, or rather nightmares. With the Stones as with his own household, Francis kept up the pretence that all was well between himself and his sister, and when they both received invitations, he accepted them. Jane set off for the party in good spirits.

They found a houseful of guests at Clicket Hall. Thomas, the host, was well dressed and genial; Mary, though fatter than ever and bulging out of her silk dress, glowed with pride at her daughter’s catch. It promised to be a most happy occasion.

Except that this time Luke Palmer had been well enough to accompany his son Ralph. Ralph, dark and debonair, was very much the dutiful son, helping his elderly father out of the saddle and offering him an arm into the house. Not that Luke Palmer seemed to need help. He had taken a physician’s advice, adopted a rigorous diet and overcome his gout. He had ridden all the way from Bideford. He clearly approved of Dorothy. But it was Luke Palmer who caused the atmosphere to deteriorate, when he rose to his feet halfway through the feast and made a startling speech.

In it, he expressed conventional good wishes to the couple, but then declared roundly that if Ralph were ever unfaithful to his charming bride he, Luke, would spread the news of this behaviour from one side of the country to the other and right through the royal court.

“And that won’t be all, either,” he had added, looking as grimly at his son as though Ralph had already assembled a harem and declared that he meant to install it under his marital roof. “I’ve driven the old Adam out of him before and I will again if I have to. Mistress Dorothy, if you ever need a champion, come to me.”

Ralph turned beetroot and Dorothy’s face almost matched the crimson damask in which she was once more most unsuitably dressed. Everyone else took refuge in a shattered silence. Such remarks, people commented afterward, were in extremely bad taste and typical of Luke Palmer.

The normal atmosphere of a betrothal feast did presently show signs of recovery, with Dorothy, now smiling again, as the centre of attention, but there was more embarrassment to come. Triumphant at being betrothed to so handsome a fellow as Ralph, and full of her recent sojourn at court, Dorothy, who had once had so little to say for herself, became talkative.

There had been plague in London, she said. Her tirewoman Madge had fallen victim to it, though fortunately while she was off duty for a few days, visiting relatives in London. “The outbreak was mainly in the town,” Dorothy said. “But I was glad to come home, though in fact, King Henry has sent the queen and her women to Richmond Palace. To be out of harm’s way, he said,” she added with a knowing smile. “But it’s really to get her out of his way. He’s courting Kate Howard nowadays.”

“You were privy to what the king was thinking, then?” Ralph said, amused, and winked wickedly at Jane. “Didn’t have his eye on you, did he?”

Luke didn’t see the wink, but Dorothy did and shot a resentful glance at Jane. Jane, at that moment, felt sorry for her and could almost understand Luke Palmer’s anxiety on his future daughter-in-law’s behalf. To Ralph, clearly, she was no more than the accompaniment to a valuable dowry, which he would sequester for his own use.

And then Thomas Stone said, “It’s natural for a king to flirt a little. It may not be serious. He tried to flirt with your sister, didn’t he, Francis, which is why she’s with us now. She ran away from him.”

“Oh, Jane,” said Dorothy, and laughed in that carefully modulated way that court ladies used for putting each other down. Jane felt herself bristling.

“What do you mean, Dorothy?” her mother asked.

“I’m sorry. I won’t say any more,” Dorothy replied, holding out her goblet for some more wine.

“No, come along,” said Francis. “What’s in your mind, Dorothy?”

Dorothy shook her head, but her eyes gleamed with malice, and Mary Stone, with maddening obtuseness, chose to be persistent. “Dorothy, you can’t say just a little and then stop. You must tell us what you mean.”

Dorothy looked at Jane. “Well, the king did dance with you once or twice, but he danced with most of the ladies at times. That wasn’t really why you left the court, was it?”

“Yes, it was,” said Jane, and heard the defensiveness in her own voice. It was she, not Dorothy, who sounded unconvincing.

“Oh, Jane! You know you kept losing things, and arriving late for this or that occasion and you often said how homesick you were. In the end, Queen Anna decided you’d never be a successful maid of honour and kindly arranged for you to go home. I understood, though,” said Dorothy with spurious sympathy. “I missed my home, too. No one blames you. But it wasn’t anything to do with the king.”

“I’m afraid it was,” said Jane, as coolly as she could. “I did indeed miss my home but I came back, of my own choice, for the reason I have given. My maid Lisa will bear me out.”

“Oh, no doubt. I’m sure Lisa is loyal to you, and so she should be. No one would criticize her for that,” said Dorothy sweetly.

It was clever, Jane thought bitterly. It was fiendishly clever, couched in terms that sounded kind, even though the intention behind it was as unkind as it could possibly get.

“Well, well,” said Francis calmly. “I daresay, Jane, that you did miss your home, though you’d have got over that if you’d given yourself time. And maybe you were a little overwhelmed by a few compliments from King Henry or invitations to dance. It’s all in the past now. Let us not talk of this anymore. Has anyone else had trouble lately with foxes trying to get at their poultry? There was a dogfox prowling after mine last week, though the dogs and the gander saw him off….”

They were home again and Jane had retired to her chamber to sit on a stool in her loose bedgown and over-robe while Lisa brushed her hair, when Francis tapped on the door and was admitted. He gave Lisa a dismissive glance and she left them together. Francis sat down on the side of the bed. “So, now we know.”

“Now we know what?” Jane asked, brushing her long brown hair herself. It gave her hands something to do and stopped them from shaking. Francis looked so very forbidding.

“The real reason why you left the court. You weren’t afraid of the king! You were ordered home for idleness and incompetence. You seem to have added lies to foolishness.”

“You believe Dorothy, then?”

“Why should Dorothy lie? You often said you didn’t want to go to court. I suspect that you simply gave way to your absurd pining for home, failed to do your duties properly and got yourself dismissed—half if not entirely deliberately.”

“Dorothy lied because she doesn’t like me,” said Jane tiredly.

“That’s absurd. Why ever shouldn’t she?”

“I have no interest in Ralph Palmer,” said Jane, deciding on candour. “But Dorothy believes he only cares for her dowry and that if mine were bigger, he’d prefer me to her. She was also jealous of the attention the king paid me! She hates me for it.”

“If you have no interest in Ralph Palmer,” said Francis unexpectedly, “then I’m surprised at you. He’s personable enough, I would have said! Though I saw your face when Peter Carew rode away. I suppose he’s the one you’d like. You can forget that, my girl. The Carews, even more than the Palmers, go in for advantageous marriages. What am I to do with you?”

“I wish you’d just try believing me, Francis! It’s true I didn’t really want to go to court, but I fled from it for the reasons I told you. I was not dismissed. Can’t I be useful to you here?”

“I don’t need you here, Jane. Peggy manages very well with the maids.” Francis rose to his feet. “I don’t know for sure whether the liar is Dorothy or you, but I’m inclined to think it’s you. I don’t mind keeping Lisa on, if she’s willing to stay. She must be a good seamstress—tirewomen usually are. There is always work for a skilled needle in a house like this. But as for you…”

“Francis, what are you saying?”

“Harry Hudd is still looking for a young wife and you don’t want to go far from home. He’s a decent, honest man, Jane. He’s older than you, but he’s still under fifty, and he lives just down the hill. Your dowry will be more than enough for him! I shall talk to him tomorrow.”

“Francis, no!” Jane could hardly believe her ears. She stared blankly at her brother. Memories flooded back—of their parents’ deaths, of how Francis had hugged his sisters and they had hugged him back and they had all cried together. Now Sybil was exiled and Jane was to be thrown to—Harry Hudd and Rixons.

“Please!” Jane said to her brother’s implacable eyes. “He’s…he’s old and Rixons farmhouse is awful, so cramped and dirty and…”

“The roof is sound. I’ve seen to that, and you can clean the house. Don’t argue, Jane. I don’t suppose he will. I wouldn’t have foisted Sybil on to him, carrying another man’s love child, but you’re a different matter. Determinedly virtuous, according to you,” said Francis with a kind of grim humour. “As far as I’m concerned, it’s settled.”

He left the room. That night Jane did not sleep. In the morning he went out early, riding his new horse Silvertail. He didn’t return until after dinner and Peggy expressed anxiety. “Saw that new animal of his bucking as the master rode off. The master’s good in the saddle, but I’d say that horse has a vicious streak.”

Francis, however, reappeared at suppertime, looking pleased with himself. Over the meal, he said, “Jane, tomorrow morning you will have a caller. Wait in the courtyard at the back if the weather’s fine, in the parlour if not. Don’t wear brocade or damask, but look clean and tidy.”

“Why? Who is the caller?”

“Wait and see,” said Francis, and withdrew to his chamber before she could ask any further. Not that she needed to ask. She already knew. Ahead of her lay another sleepless night.

Next day it was sunny. Shortly after breakfast the caller duly arrived and Francis brought him to the rear courtyard, where Jane was miserably sitting on a stone bench. Harry Hudd, his cap in his hand, his wind-reddened face carefully shaved and his square body encased in the brown fustian doublet and hose which were his nearest approach to a formal suit, had come to ask Jane Sweetwater to marry him.

“I’ve your brother’s consent. There’s no need to worry about that, maid.”

Worry about it? Could even Harry Hudd imagine that she would worry if Francis forbade the banns?

“I’ve not that much to offer, but I’ve got summat. Good health I’ve got. I’m all in workin’ order and likely there’ll be little ones. I reckon ’ee’d like that. Most women want childer. House b’ain’t much, but I’ll leave ’ee free to do whatever’s best. There’ll be money enough—thy dowry and a bit I’ve got put by, only bein’ just a man, I’ve never known how to make a house pretty. My old wife long ago, she knew, but that’s long in the past. She were sickly, that’s why we had no babbies. That were her, not me. I’ve a good flock of sheep, all my own, and half a dozen cows in milk and I hear ’ee’s handy in the dairy. Hear ’ee’s good with poultry, too. We don’t keep geese, but there’s a duck pond….”

He went on and on, reciting the virtues of Rixons, as if she didn’t know them already and as if they could possibly compensate for the shortcomings of their proprietor. At the end, she said that she must have time to think and he seemed to approve of that. Maidenly and very proper were the words he used to describe it. He’d come back the next day for her answer, he said, and bowed himself out.

“The answer will be no,” said Jane to Francis when he came out to her after saying goodbye to Harry. “You can’t really believe that I’ll agree to this!” But she said it with fear in her voice. There were ways, and everyone knew it, of inducing unwilling daughters or sisters to marry where their families wished. Plenty of ways.

“If you don’t agree,” said Francis, “then you must shift for yourself. This will no longer be your home. Go to the Lanyons and ask if they’ll take in another ill-behaved girl who’s been ejected from Allerbrook House. Pity there aren’t any nunneries left now where I could send you. But I won’t have you here. Smile and do as you’re bid, and I’ll see it’s a good wedding and I’ll say it’s what you want, what you’ve chosen. I’ll add to your dowry—you’ll be able to put your new home well and truly to rights. It won’t be a bad bargain.”

“Francis, please don’t do this! What have I done that’s so terrible? Refuse to become someone’s mistress? Even if the man was the king, does it make any difference? Oh, what can I say to make you understand? Ask Dr. Spenlove what he thinks! He won’t approve of this, you know he won’t….”

“Spenlove will mind his tongue or else leave my employment.”

“Francis, please…!”

She burst into tears, but Francis merely seized hold of her, clapped a hand over her mouth and marched her indoors. He took her to her bedchamber, pushed her in and locked the door after her. She lay on the bed for most of the day, alternately crying and trying in vain to think of a way out. She had always known that Francis had a hard streak in him. He had taken on the duty of caring for his sisters, but in Francis’s mind this was balanced by their duty to obey him. He had abandoned Sybil for failing him. He would abandon Jane as easily.

She had another dreadful night, visualizing herself turned out, wandering, seeking for shelter, perhaps being taken in by the Lanyons out of charity, perhaps ending up as Sybil apparently had—a servant on a farm.

At Rixons she would at least be mistress of some kind of house, however ill-kempt; she would be a wife; and yes, there might be children. The thought of going to bed with Harry Hudd made her feel ill, but in the dark she wouldn’t be able to see him. For the first time she felt real sympathy for King Henry. When confronted with Anna of Cleves, his feelings had probably been similar to Jane’s now.

Harry came back the following morning for his answer. Jane, her eyes heavy and her face pale from lack of sleep, once more greeted him in the courtyard. She wore the same dress as on the previous day, a plain brown affair, opening over a green linen underskirt. It was respectable but not luxurious, nothing like the gown of a court lady.

Harry Hudd bowed, and smiled his unlovely smile and asked for his answer and Jane, trying to smile back, said yes. The wedding took place one month later, early in July, at St. Anne’s in Clicket. Father Drew conducted the service. Both he and Dr. Spenlove had been astonished by her choice, as indeed had everyone else. Jane was obliged to parry astounded protests and questions from Lisa, Peggy, the maids, the grooms, neighbours and friends alike. It was pride as much as fear of Francis that made her hold up her chin and declare that this was what she wanted.

And now it was done, and here she was in the Rixons farmhouse, which had one untidy living room, a kitchen with an earth floor, and two spartan bedchambers upstairs under the thatch, and she would be Mistress Harry Hudd for as long as they both should live.

Harry, having finished what he was about, rolled out of bed and said, “Well, now. Milkin’. Can’t go lazin’ around here all the day long. I can hear they cows lowin’ now. Up thee comes, maid,” and held out a hand to her. Another day at Rixons had begun.

She tried to make the best of it. She was probably better off than little Kate Howard, who was now married to the king. There had been proclamations everywhere, announcing that Queen Anna was henceforth to be known as Lady Anna of Cleves, the king’s dear sister, and would live in state but away from the court. Jane wondered if Lady Anna felt relieved, but it must have been a comedown, to be deprived of a crown. Thomas Cromwell, whom the king held responsible for the whole disaster of the Cleves marriage, had been beheaded. No, there were certainly ways in which Mistress Jane Hudd had blessings worth counting.