Paula Marshall - The Deserted Bride

His grim face, however, when he returned from Sir Braithwaite’s tower room, gave her no reason to expect that she was going to receive much mercy from him, either at the banquet—or anywhere else. His cousin Charles, by contrast, had an expression on his face which showed that one person, at least, was deriving some amusement from the situation.

“I am at your service, madam,” Drew announced. “Bid your Steward to escort us to the Hall.”

He held his hand out to take hers as though nothing was amiss, but his mouth, set in a hard straight line, was an indication that their private life, like their public one, was to be as coldly formal as his voice.

Gilbert the Steward, however, was delighted. If he had a complaint about Lady Bess’s rule, it was that she was too easy in her conduct of it. All the heavily manned little ceremonies which Sir Braithwaite had insisted upon had been done away with. And, since they mostly centred around Gilbert’s affairs, he had felt that his station in the Atherington household had been demeaned.

Plainly his new master thought differently, and so they all processed majestically into the Hall, where pages, at Gilbert’s instructions, ran forward with napkins and bowls of water. The napkins were to protect the guests’ fine clothing, and the water was for them to rinse their hands in after they had eaten of the roast beef, the chickens, the pigs’ trotters and all the other delicacies carried in on great platters by another half-score of obedient pages. The napkins then found their further use in drying wet hands, although some still preferred the old custom of waving them in the air. Gilbert was beside himself with joy.

Not so Bess. She hated ceremony, considering it a waste of precious time. For her, informality was all. She wondered what Drew’s preference was. The fact that he was being so correct in his conduct today was not necessarily a guide to his character if she remembered how lustily—and improperly—he had set about her yesterday!

She stole a look at his noble profile as he sat beside her. It was still grim, and his mouth was set in stern lines. She wondered if she dare try to soften it. She would have to go carefully, for seated as they were in the place of honour in the middle of the long table, all eyes were upon them, save for those few of their senior officers who shared their side of it.

She was about to speak when Drew forestalled her.

“I desire an explanation from you, madam my wife, as to why you did not see fit to inform me of your uncle’s grave and disabling accident.”

So, war had been declared, had it? There was to be no peace over the dinner plates. The best form of defence, Bess had long ago concluded, was attack. She went on to it, keeping her voice low, but firm.

“Not so, m’lord husband. You were kept fully informed. Do try the chicken legs, I beg of you. They are tenderer than most because of the delicate foodstuffs Dame Margery insists on. Meat cannot be tender, she avows, if what is put in the animal to make it grow is tough.” The gaze she turned on Drew was a melting one.

Drew was not melted. “To the devil with Dame Margery—and her chicken legs, too,” he said roughly. “Do not seek to deceive me, wife. I am of the belief that you lied to your Council and to me.”

“Now why should you think that, husband? And it is unkind of you to curse Dame Margery. She is a very hard worker, and loyal to Atherington—as are all my servants.”

“And is she a liar, too? Does she also go running around…?” Drew stopped himself and cursed inwardly. He had not meant to refer to yesterday’s contretemps, and here he was reminding her of it! Not a very clever ploy. In life, as in chess, one did not give the enemy an advantage. He swallowed his words and started again.

“You may be sure that I, and my advisers, will examine your books and documents with the utmost care, and if I find any maladministration, I shall know full well who is to blame.”

Attack! Attack! Trumpets were blowing in Bess’s brain. “And you will not blame yourself, husband—if you do find anything amiss, which I doubt—that for ten long years you have ignored Atherington and left us to our fate? I have been a woman for six full summers, ready to do a wife’s duty, and bear your children. Address your reproaches to the one who deserves them, sir, which is not my good self, but one who is nearer home to you!”

Oh, sweet Lord! Now she had done it. She had lost her temper—as, by his expression, he was losing his. He leaned forward, food forgotten, and said between his teeth, “Do you not fear a day of reckoning, my lady wife? For you should.”

“No more than you should,” returned Bess hardily.

How dare he reproach her, how dare he? Her eyes flashed at him, as they locked with his, stare for stare. Not only their food, but the spectators were forgotten.

“Oh, indeed,” he sneered. “And that youth who was with you yesterday—is all seemly between you?” He had meant to save this for the privacy of their room, but the woman would tempt a saint to misbehave, for even as they wrangled he wanted to fall upon her and have his way with her; the way which he had been denied yestermorn.

For she was temptation itself. How could he be moved by one who was so unlike all the women whom he had favoured so far? She was black, not blonde, her eyes were dark, not blue, her complexion was pale, not rosy, she was not small, but was of a good height—and instead of being meek in speech she had a tongue like the Devil. Nor did she fail to use it at every turn.

By God, it would be a pleasure to master her, to ride her to the Devil who had blessed, nay, cursed her with that tongue. Aye, and beyond him to the lowest pit of Hell where only the demons lurked, forgotten even by their unsavoury Lord! The very thought of using her so was doing cruel and untoward things to his body.

Drew tried to calm himself. He must not let her catch him on the raw every time she spoke.

“I think you mistake a woman’s place, madam. It is to be quiet, to obey her lord, to be meek at all times…”

“I’d as lief be dead!” Bess could not help herself. The words flew out of her, interrupting him in his catalogue of what a good woman should be.

“I have no mind,” she exclaimed in ringing tones which the whole table could hear, “to be like patient Griselda in Master Chaucer’s poem, who pitifully thanks her husband for his mistreatment of her.”

“Nor am I minded to be the husband of a nagging wife, always determined to have the last word.” Drew roared this as though the demons he had conjured up were at his back, prodding him with their pitchforks.

Well, at least formality had flown out of the window and honesty had taken its place, thought Bess, stifling a smile at the sight of all the shocked faces around the table.

Worse, aunt Hamilton was quavering at her, “Oh, my niece, my dear niece, remember that your husband stands in the place of your God—to be obeyed at all times…This is no fashion in which to conduct yourself…and in a public place, too.”

Little though she cared to admit it, Bess knew that aunt Hamilton was right—at least as regards the place in which her differences with her husband ought to be aired.

She gave an abrupt laugh, and put her hand out towards Drew’s, saying, “How now, my lord, let us cry quits for this meal, at least—and shake hands on it. We are not players on a stage, paid to entertain an audience.”

His wife had spoken as frankly and freely as any boy, and her manner was smilingly confident as she did so. The moment—and the relationship between the pair of them—swung in the balance. Drew was aware that he could base his answer on his own masculinity and his consequent right to rule his wife, and thus reject her offer outright. All between them would then lie in ruins. Or, he could forget his husbandly rights, take her offered hand, cry truce—and let the game start again.