Lindsay Townsend (2 page)

“Thank you,” Isabella murmured, wishing she
could stay where she was until Amice returned. Knowing she must leave before
she was missed in the workshop, she flung back the covers and scrambled to her
feet. “I do not know where I will be tomorrow. Sometimes my mother-in-law keeps
me at home.”

“I will find you.”

****

The following day it was raining harder and
foggy, a thick gray miasma coating the city roofs and towers. Isabella fretted
about Amice having to visit her in this dismal murk, but her mother-in-law
found an excuse to dispatch her into it.

“I have a fancy for oysters and malmsey,”
Margery instructed, counting a few pennies into Isabella's hand. “You must go,
girl, I can spare no other. Take the spit-boy with you as guide, though you do
not really need one, do you? Not with your parents living so close by the
docks.”

“Honored mother.” Knowing Margery would be
irritated by that form of address, Isabella followed it up with a bow and
stalked out into the pouring rain. She and the spit-boy scowled at each other
until the end of the street, marched around a corner, shook hands and parted
ways. Nigel was her ally, although both knew he was meant to spy on her for the
family. Now they were free for an hour or so and Isabella intended to make full
use of the time.

She called on Amice first, but her friend
was also out and Amice’s limping apprentice had no idea where she could be
found. Resigned to seeing Amice as God willed it, Isabella drew her molting fur
cloak tightly about her shoulders and trod nimbly beneath the dripping jetties.

She loved being out in the city, part of
its vivid heart. She was always excited to be in London, even in the dreadful
year of pestilence when Richard had taken Matthew and, with his kin, fled the
city for their holding in East Ham. She and the prentices had been left in the
workshop and it had been hard. When she did not dread the boils and bloody
coughing she feared fire, or looters, but they had all come through—London had
not failed her, even then. Now, slipping and sliding through the muddy alleys,
avoiding shadowed corners, flicking a small coin to a beggar camped beneath a
jetty, she heard a hundred different voices in the fog and a dozen different
tongues and knew she was home.

Matthew should be with me, learning these
streets. 

She did not make for the docks. Oyster and
wine sellers thronged the city, so she wasted no effort on the wharves where
wine barrels were unloaded. She had no desire to encounter her father, although
he had lately grown so rich as a vintner that he might not trouble to be out on
such a day.

Reflected in the pallid fog, a moving,
closing shadow shimmered against the wattle wall of the house opposite.
Frustrated by her small, female state, Isabella hunched into a doorway and
waited until the creeping footpad vanished along another narrow lane. Amice
stalked these alleys like a warrior but Amice was tall and knew how to fight
with a knife. Shorter by half a head and allowed no decent blades, Isabella was
constantly reminded of how easily she could be mauled. Had Richard not proved
that, night after night?

Hearing the bells of great Saint Paul's
thundering above her, watching the hop-and-skip of folk darting in and out of
the rain, she waited until she could make out the raucous calls of the street
sellers again. Moving on, she turned off the house-step—straight into the path
of a man leading a bay horse and eating a pie.

“Hold there!”

The stranger tossed his pie to a shivering
urchin and caught Isabella as she slithered back, his grip firm but not cruel. “If
you would be a cut-purse, girl, you need to be quieter.” He stared down at her
while his horse chewed on a slither of hanging roof-thatch and a water-seller
shouldered past them both, muttering curses.

“Forgive me, sir.” Isabella did not
recognize the man but she was keen to be on her way. He was taller than Amice
and almost as dark, with a tanned, clean-shaven face and penetrating eyes.
Green-gray eyes, she realized with a jolt, as he plucked her off the step and
up onto the saddle of his mount with the same ease as she might lift a toddler.

“Unhand me!”

“Where are you going?” he asked, ignoring
her protest. She began to slide off the back of the glossy bay but he
anticipated that move and stopped her simply by catching her foot.

“Sir!”

“This is neither the weather nor the place
for a decent maid,” he went on, his green-gray eyes sparkling with amusement as
she glowered at him. “Let me take you where you need to be.”

Isabella knew she looked like a servant. “Why
would you do that?”

He grinned and released her foot. “Even
beggars deserve kindness now and then. Besides, you did not get those good
teeth and fine accents on any midden heap. Now, where should I carry you away
to?”

They were moving, Isabella realized, the
horse piling through a vast puddle with the man splashing carelessly alongside.
Another moment and they would be within sight of the grand houses and palaces
of the river, and, to the north, the goldsmiths' new guildhall, still being
built.

It would not do for him to escort her there
with so many wagging tongues eager to take the news to Sir William.
If need
be, I shall tell my own gossip and, please God, be rewarded for it with a visit
to or from my son.

“Here,” she called, pointing to a small
glover's shop tucked around the corner of a crooked alley. “This is my place.”

The stranger reined in at once. Before
Isabella could stir he swept her off his horse and lightly onto the cobbles,
nodding to the wide-eyed glover. “I will see you safe within.”

“There is no need.” Conscious of his height
and breadth and easy strength, Isabella felt heat tiding into her face. She
prayed she was not blushing. “Thank you for your help, Sir…?”

He smiled, his eyes still bright with
amusement, and answered readily, “Stephen Fletcher, at your service, Mistress
Angel.”

Isabella automatically gasped.
The very
man I have to win!
All calculation deserted her as they stared at each
other.
What will it be like to be in Stephen’s arms? What will his kisses be
like?

Heedless of the prickling rain, Stephen studied
her for a long moment, his eyes narrowing as if he guessed her thoughts.
Isabella forced herself to bow her head, her breath threatening to stop as she
waited, crucified by his silence.
What now? Should I say more, do more?

She felt a gentle touch, softer than rain,
brush against her cheek.

 “I pass this way tomorrow,” he said
softly. “I need new gloves.”

“I shall be here.”
Why did I say that?
‘Tis madness to promise anything!

“Until tomorrow, Mistress Angel.” Stroking
another raindrop from her flushed face and raising a hand in farewell, Stephen
mounted his bay and cantered off in the direction of the river.

Within the great hall of her dead husband’s
kindred, Isabella stood, as ordered, beside the small spring fire and traced a
fire tong with her foot. She had sent a messenger to Sir William, informing him
of her chance encounter with Stephen Fletcher, and hoped her uncle would allow
her to see Matthew in return. That hope had been swiftly dashed.

Sir William leaned forward on his seat. “You
did not tell Stephen Fletcher your name?”

“There was no time. But I will return to
the glovers to wait for him and then—”

“Absolutely not!” Sir William leapt to his
feet. “He must see you as a lady to be wooed and won, not a common strumpet!”

“You said I should be available and willing
to be his mistress.”

Sir William stormed from the dais and
slapped her. “Do not be insolent with me! You present yourself as a gentlewoman.
Stephen Fletcher is the armorer to the duke, not a stable-hand!”

“Not a blacksmith then?” Isabella
countered, amazed at herself. “I have a plan for that,” she went on, with a
steely calmness she did not feel. “Sir Nicholas has approved it.”

At the mention of one of the most powerful
men in the goldsmiths' guild, Sir William became very still and quiet. “How is
this possible?” he demanded. “How do you even know him?”

“I agreed the details yesterday, while I
was out fetching wine and oysters,” Isabella replied. “I am one of the maidens
in the golden cages.”

That silenced her uncle by marriage, but it
gave her little satisfaction.
Still Sir William will not let me visit my
son.

Her face smarted and her teeth ached but
that was nothing. The tears blurring her vision were not because of the slap
.
I hoped, really hoped, that he would let me see Matthew again
. Sometimes
she feared that he would never relent.

****

A few days later, Isabella, with a frowning
Amice hovering close, climbed carefully out of the jetty window of Sir
Nicholas' house and into a tall, gilded cage suspended above the cobbles of
Cheapside
. The dawning May sun glittered on the fragile walls of her “prison”
and the road below was unusually clean. She had been one of those sent out to
scrub the cobbles only the day before.

“Fine weather at last and a good day for
the procession,” Amice remarked, her hands gripped firmly on the window ledge. “But
it will be hours yet.”

Isabella shrugged. “I am here now.”
And
out of reach of my kindred, should they change their minds and decide another
of the family's womenfolk should bring honor to this spot. 

Amice tugged on the cage, her dark brows
heavy with suspicion. “The front of this is very low. Mind you do not take a
fainting fit and tumble out.”

Isabella smiled and reached back through
the window to hug her friend. “I shall be very well. Have you the gold and
silver flowers?”

“Safe in a basket at my feet. Listen! The
church bells are chiming. It will soon begin.”

Isabella felt a frisson of excitement
though, as Amice had said, it would be hours yet before the procession reached
her cage. It would take an age for all the grand folk to cross the city, the members
of the guilds, all in their livery, Prince Edward and his retinue, and finally
the captured French king. Her Londoners were a curious people and they would
gather in their hundreds to witness this fine spectacle. Already she could see
crowds clustering in the nearby streets and men and women in the houses looking
down onto
Cheapside,
opening the shutters of their upper
windows to enjoy the view. She leaned out and looked toward the looming spire
of Saint Paul's, along the broad, smooth road known simply as
The Street
in
the city, where the goldsmiths had their shops and houses.

“Be careful, Issa,” Amice whispered
urgently behind her. “You are no use to Matthew with a broken neck.”

But it is so glorious today, so warm and
gold. The sky is like a cornflower. I know all will be well. It must be well.
Isabella turned and smiled to reassure her
friend. Stretching out her hands, she clasped Amice's, tight about the
window-ledge. “Why not go downstairs?” she said softly, aware of her friend's
dislike of heights. “You will be closer to the princes, when they come.”

  Amice shook her head, her dark curls
flying. “Closer to lewd fellows and sweaty prentices, too.”

“For today the street is filled with rose
petals,” Isabella tempted her.

“For today I shall stay here, as I
promised, with you.” Amice swallowed and deliberately unclenched her fists,
planting her hands on her hips and her head on one side. “You are
saffron-bright today, Issa, and you smell better.”

“Thanks to your perfumes,” Isabella laughed,
flicking one of the long gold earrings that Amice habitually wore and silently
admiring her companion's elegant, red velvet gown. Her own dress was more
ornate, a pink tunic over a green kirtle with trailing sleeves, richly
embroidered in gold with the badges of Sir William's family. She wore a gold
crespine in her red-gold hair and her mother-in-law Margery had insisted she
don a pair of white gloves that already felt sticky. “Do you think the French
king will be handsome?”

“We shall see. I am more interested to see
your man. You will point him out to me?”

“Of course.” Horns blew in the distance and
Isabella turned to face
The Street
again, wondering how long it would be
before she caught sight of Stephen in the retinue of the duke.

“It is good that you know what he looks
like, though no thanks to your family.”

“I think he will be kind,” Isabella
murmured, to reassure herself.

Behind her, Amice made a sound in her
throat to show that she was less than convinced. “What will he do if he sees
you? If he recognizes you and thinks you duped him in your first meeting?”

“He is kind,” Isabella repeated. “I am sure
of it.”
Soon I will know and pray God I am right.

For now she could only wait and watch and pick
her time to fall, as fall she must.

****

His daughter slept in his arms now, so
peacefully. Stephen did not want to leave her. He did not want to venture back
into the slop bucket of London and parade like a dancing bear with the nobles
and great of the city. His daughter was finally at rest and he wanted to stay
with her.

Stephen frowned and rolled his powerful
shoulders, spying the pink and gold of dawn through the small gap in the closed
shutter casement and regarding it not as the blessing of a new day but an
ever-present challenge. These breathing fits of Joanna's terrified her and
racked him with impotent despair. Before his wife Cecilia had died his daughter
had been a bright, spirited girl and had never sickened. He had striven for
honor and power, proud of his skill, eager to show off his connections to Duke
Henry, the foremost knight of the world. He had married Cecilia for her wit,
bearing and land and had never expected to love her. Unlacing, happy love had
ambushed him all the same. She had become his moon and sun, cool, tranquil and
elegant by day, rosy, glowing and tingling by night.

His wife haunted him. He sought her in dreams
and in the outer world—a warm glance from a woman, the call or gesture of some
unknown girl were all sweet reminders of Cecilia, who lived anew in them for
him.

“How can she be dead?” he muttered,
twitching away at the thought as a horse does at a gadfly. Joanna, sucking her
thumb, rolled in his arms as Cecilia had once rolled in bed toward him and he
grieved afresh. “How could she leave us?”

It had not been the pestilence, but she had
been three days in the dying, trying to expel his son in a long, dreadful
child-birth. The midwife had urged him to save the boy but he had wanted
Cecilia, not some changeling stranger. In the bitter end he had lost them both
and the world had turned gray, the charge after glory meaningless. He was two
years a widower and still his grief was battle-sword sharp at times.

The door to the small solar at the back of
the timber house creaked open and his sister bustled in. “Still not groomed,
Stevie
?”
she scolded, lifting Joanna from his arms and tucking the child into the small
bed beneath the window. “You should look your best and who knows? You may see
your London glover's girl again.”

Stephen grunted a response, wishing he had
never spoken of the lass. Worse, Bedelia knew he had returned to the city to
watch for her—his sister never said anything but he knew she knew.

'Tis all folly
, he told himself, for the wench had vanished, as teasing
and unreal as the glass nail he had once been told to find when first
apprenticed. She had been a spirited creature, too, with a sadness clinging
about her slender limbs as if she had lost someone dear. He would have liked to
discover more of her, but then it was plain her life was not her own. He had
searched several glovers' shops for her, without success.

“Probably married,” he remarked, sensing
his older sister's knowing glance on him. “Certainly a liar. All women are.” He
rose and stretched, putting his palms on the white-washed ceiling.

“Nonsense. I have lit a candle in church
for you to find her again.”

Stephen shot a quick look at Joanna in case
she overheard and thought him disrespectful to her mother, but his daughter
slumbered on, coiled in the sheets like a baby hedgehog in leaves. “You will
let her sleep?”

“Until she wakes by nature.”

“You meddle, sister.”

“Nonsense!” Bedelia flicked him with her
spindle as he edged past her. She was tall, as he was, and handsome, especially
when her features were animated, as now. “If our saint denies me a good wax
candle on this bright day it is a poor thing. But you, set to! Shave your chin,
comb your hair, wash your face.”

“Yes, mamma.” Bedelia’s husband Alan was a
merchant and Stephen lodged at their house when Alan was away at sea.
My
sister forgets I am not a child anymore, though I bless her for her care of my
Joanna
. He slipped round the door and strode off into the great hall to
escape more instructions. The blaze of sunshine through the narrow minstrel's
gallery put him in mind of the mystery girl's red-gold eyebrows and lashes and
he grinned, finally catching the promise of the day.

London is a spit-pot but the girl is there
somewhere and today, with the guilds scrambling to display for the French king,
I will find her again, pray God.
She had reminded him of Cecilia, but different, intriguing.

The quest pleased him and he broke into a
run, hurrying to meet the day.

****

Two hours later, riding his most docile
horse with his best hunting dog trotting alongside, Stephen resigned himself to
the spectacle. His father would have loved all of this, his being in London,
part of the retinue of Duke Henry and Prince Edward, close enough so he could
actually see the French king's stately white palfrey and almost touch the
captive monarch's rich black tunic. Cecilia would have loved the scattered rose
petals, the gleaming streets and the kingfisher brightness of the English
knights, arrayed in their best. He was less pleased to be in a stiff new tunic
and tight new hose, the more so since one of the knights of the garter had
hissed in his ear to be on the look out for lurking assassins on the roof-tops.

“The merchants promise the streets are safe
but what do they know?” the burly knight had spat. “Duke Henry wants you to
look, you have the keenest eyes.”
And a wicked way with a throwing knife
the
knight might have added, as both of them knew it.

So he was watching, guarding, and mighty
glad of his lord's trust. But, as he twisted to and fro in the saddle, glancing
from roof top to roof top, the new cloth chafed the back of his neck.

Going soft, Stephen
? Ignoring the bawling of the mob he fixed
on the jetties and roof tiles, staring into shadows and sun-flashes. The gaudy
troop of soldiers and knights, already shifting at a slow canter, settled into
a meandering amble as the road through
Cheapside
broadened between
the grander houses belonging to the members of the goldsmith's guild.

“Ici, l
à
!”
cried Prince Edward, sweeping a bejeweled gloved arm toward the upper
storeys
.
Beside him, on his taller horse, the French king looked up and softly
applauded. Stephen scanned the ridge tiles of the freshly-painted, gilded
houses and glanced where the prince was pointing.

There she is
. He smiled.

He recognized her instantly by the proud
tilt of her head, her sweetly handsome profile and those glowing eyes, more
compelling even than the luxuriant gold of her hair or her sumptuous costume.

Goldsmith
’
s
garb and no glover
’
s girl for sure
, he thought, reining in his horse and slowing to
admire her the more as she shimmered above him like the evening star. Encased
in a narrow cage of gold suspended above the cobbles, he saw that she was one
of twelve maidens positioned high above the street, all caged, all lovely, but
his gaze returned to her alone. Already the others seemed pale shadows, water
ripples, echoes.
But she is stunning.
Above the roar of  blood in his
ears he heard the ribald comments of Prince Edward and knew he also approved of
her.