Winsor, Kathleen (143 page)

But
Corinna refused to think what they so obviously wanted her to think. She told
herself that surely she had enough sophistication to realize that idle people
often liked to cause
trouble among those they found happier and more content than themselves. And
she wanted passionately to keep her belief in Bruce and in all that he meant to
her. She was determined that her marriage should not be shaken because one
woman was infatuated with her husband and others wished to destroy her faith in
him. Corinna was not yet acquainted with Whitehall, for that took time, like
accustoming oneself, after sunlight, to a darkened room.

But
in spite of herself she found a mean resentful feeling of jealousy growing
within her against the Duchess of Ravenspur. When she saw her look at Bruce or
talk with him, sit across from him at the card-table, dance with him, or merely
tap him on the shoulder with her fan as she went by, Corinna felt suddenly sick
inside and cold with nervous apprehension.

At
last she admitted it to herself; she hated that woman. And she was ashamed of
herself for hating her.

And
yet she did not know what she could do to stop the progress of what she feared
was rapidly becoming an affair, in the London sense of the word. Bruce was no
boy to be ordered around, forbidden to come home late or warned to stop ogling
some pretty woman. Certainly there had been nothing so far in his behaviour
which was real cause for suspicion. The morning she had met him leaving the
Duchess's apartments he had been perfectly cool and casual, not in the least
embarrassed to be found there. He was as attentive and devoted to her as he had
ever been, and she believed that she had a reasonably accurate idea as to where
he spent his time when they were apart.

I
must be wrong! she told herself. I've never lived in a palace or a great city
before and I suppose I'm suspecting all sorts of things that aren't true. But
if only it were
any
other woman—I don't think I'd feel the way I do.

To
compensate in her heart for the suspicions she held against him, Corinna was
more gay and charming than ever. She was so afraid that he would notice
something different in her manner and guess at its cause. What would he think
of her then—to know how mean she could be, how petty and jealous? And if she
was wrong—as she persistently told herself she must be—it would be Bruce who
would lose faith in her. Their marriage had seemed to her complete and perfect;
she was terrified lest something happen through her own fault to spoil it.

Because
of the Duchess she had come to dislike London— though it had been the dream of
her life to revisit it someday—and she wished that they might leave
immediately. She had begun to wonder if her Grace was the reason why he had
suggested staying in London during her pregnancy—instead of going to Paris.
That was why she did not dare suggest herself that they cross over to France to
spend the time with his sister. Suppose he should guess her reason? For how
could she explain such a wish when he said it was for her own safety
and both of
them were so desperately anxious to have this child? (Their son had died the
year before, not three months old, in the smallpox epidemic which was raging
through Virginia.)

With
some impatience and scorn she chided herself for her cowardice. I'm his
wife—and he loves me. If this woman is anything to him at all she can be only
an infatuation. It's nothing that will last. I'll still be living with him when
he's forgot he ever knew her.

One
night, to her complete surprise, he inquired in a pleasant conversational tone:
"Hasn't his Majesty asked you for an assignation?" They had just come
from the Palace and were alone now, undressing.

Corinna
glanced at him, astonished. "Why—what made you say that?"

"What?
It's obvious he admires you, isn't it?"

"He's
been very kind to me—but you're his friend. Surely you wouldn't expect a man to
cuckold his friend?"

Bruce
smiled. "My dear, a man is commonly cuckolded first by his friend. The
reason's simple enough—it's the friend who has the best opportunity."

Corinna
stared at him. "Bruce," she said softly. At the tone of her voice he
turned, just as he was pulling his shirt off, and looked at her. "How
strangely you talk sometimes. Do you know how that sounded—so cruel and
callous?"

He
flung his shirt aside and went to her, taking her into his arms. Tenderly he
smiled. "I'm sorry, my darling. But there are so many things about me you
don't know—so many years I lived before I knew you that I can never share with
you. I was grown up and had watched my father die and seen my country ruined
and fought in the army before you were ever born. When you were six months old
I was sailing with Rupert's privateers. Oh, I know—you think all that doesn't
make any difference to us now. But it does. You were brought up in a different
world from mine. We're not what we look like from the outside."

"But
you're not like them, Bruce!" she protested. "You're not like these
men here at Court!"

"Oh,
I haven't got their superficial tricks. I don't paint my eyebrows or comb my
wig in public or play with ladies' fans. But— Well, to tell the truth the age
is a little sick, and all of us who live in it have caught the sickness
too."

"But
surely
I
live in it?"

"No,
you don't!" He released her. "You're no part of this shabby world.
And thank God you're not!"

"Thank
God? But why? Don't you like these people? I thought they were your friends.
I've wished I could be more like them—the ladies, I mean." Now she was
thinking of the Duchess of Ravenspur.

His
mouth gave a bitter twist at that. "Corinna, my darling, where can you
have got such a foolish idea? Don't ever dare
think of it again. Oh, Corinna,
you can't know how glad I am that I saw you that day in Port Royal—"

Suddenly
her fears and jealousies were gone. A great and wonderful sense of relief swept
through her, washing out the hatred, the poison of mistrust that had been
festering there.

"Are
you
glad, darling? Oh, I remember it so well!"

"So
do I. You were on your way to church. And you were wearing a black-lace gown
with a black veil over your hair and roses pinned in it. I thought you were
Spanish."

"And
my father thought
you
were a buccaneer!" She threw back her head
and laughed joyously, safe back there in those happy days when no slant-eyed
minx with the title of "duchess" had existed to try to take him from
her. "He was going to send you a challenge!"

"No
wonder. I must have been a disreputable looking fellow. I hadn't got ashore
half-an-hour before. Remember—I followed you into church—"

"And
stared at me all through the service! Oh, how furious father was! But I didn't
care—I was in love with you already!"

"Dirty
clothes, five-day beard, and all?"

"Dirty
clothes, five-day beard, and all! But when you came to call that night—oh, Bruce,
you can't imagine how you looked to me! Like all the princes out of every
fairy-tale I've ever read!"

She
looked up at him, her eyes illuminated like stained-glass in a chapel. Suddenly
his own eyes closed, as if to shut out the sight of something that troubled
him, but at the same time his arms drew her close and his head bent to kiss
her. Oh, you've been a fool! Corinna told herself. Of course he loves you— and
of course he's faithful! I'd see it when he looked at me, I'd feel it when he
touched me, if he weren't.

And
yet, the next time she saw the Duchess of Ravenspur, her resentment was
stronger than ever. For the woman looked at her, she knew it, with a kind of
sliding contempt, a sort of secret sneer, as though she had an advantage over
her. Her Grace seemed, however, more friendly than she had at first, and she
always spoke to Corinna pleasantly.

But
at last Corinna felt that she could bear this uncertainty, these jealous
suspicions of hers no longer. And finally, as if in the hope that she could exorcise
the demon by speaking its name, she determined to talk to Bruce, as casually as
she could, about the Duchess—though it had been some time since she had been
able to hear the woman's name without wincing inside. They were coming home one
night from the Palace when she forced herself to begin the conversation. She
had known for a long time what she would say and had repeated the sentence over
so many times that the words seemed to come out flat and stilted.

"How
lovely the Duchess of Ravenspur looked tonight. I do think she's more beautiful
than my Lady Castlemaine— don't you?" Her heart was pounding so that she
could scarcely
hear her own voice and her hands, clenched tight inside her muff, felt wet and
cold.

Horsemen
rode beside the coach and the torches they carried threw a bright unsteady
light in upon them, but Corinna looked straight ahead. It seemed to her that he
hesitated a long while before answering and those few seconds passed in
torture. I should never have said it! she thought miserably. The sound of her
name means something to him—something I don't want to know about. I wish I had
kept quiet—

Then
she heard him say, with no more emotion in his voice than if it were some
comment upon the weather: "Yes, I think she is."

She
felt a kind of sudden relief and now she said, almost gayly: "She flirts
furiously with you. I suppose I should be jealous of her."

Bruce
looked at her and smiled faintly but made no reply.

But
Corinna was determined not to stop now that she had made the break. "Is it
true she was once an actress? Or is that only gossip? The other women don't
seem to like her. They say terrible things about her—of course, they're
probably jealous," she added hastily.

"Do
women ever like one another? Not very often, I think. But it's true she was an
actress—several years ago."

"Then
she isn't of quality?"

"No.
Her people were yeomen farmers."

"But
how did she come by her fortune and title?"

"The
only way a woman can come by such things if she isn't born to them. Somehow she
contrived to marry a rich old merchant, and when he died she inherited a third
of his money. With that she bought a title—another old man. He's dead
too."

"She's
married now, though, isn't she? But where's her husband? I've never seen
him."

"Oh,
he comes to Court sometimes. I don't think they're very well acquainted."

"Not
very well acquainted! With her own husband!" Genuinely astonished at that,
Corinna forgot her own wretched feeling of nervous tightness. "What did
she marry him for, then?"

"To
get a name for the King's bastard, I think."

"Oh,
heaven! I feel as though I'm in a strange new world here! Everything seems to
be turned upside down!"

"It
is upside down—unless you're standing on your head with the rest of them.
You'll be glad to get home again, won't you?"

"Oh,
yes!" Then, regretting her too hasty enthusiasm, she added, "But only
because I miss Summerhill—and everything it means to us." She turned her
head to look up at him, and he was so close their lips brushed and then his
mouth pressed down upon hers.

A
few days later Corinna went with her waiting-woman to
make some small
purchases at the New Exchange. The Exchange, located far out on Thames Street,
was a great blackened stone building with a double gallery on two separate
floors. Each tiny shop had its own sign that hung so low that anyone of more
than usual height must duck or dodge to avoid striking his head. The
shopkeepers were for the most part attractive well-dressed girls—though there
were a few young men—who kept daily court for their admirers. It was the most
fashionable lounging-place and rendezvous of the town, much frequented by beaus
waiting to meet some masked lady who had a father or husband to outwit. Pretty
young women came there too, flirtation-bent—but always pretending to be very
pert and disdainful when first approached.

With
her woman Corinna mounted the staircase and strolled along the gallery. Stares
and low whistles and audible comments followed her, for many of the fine ladies
would rally with the gallants, bandying barbed compliments and insults
sweetened with a smile. Corinna, however, had not caught this London habit
either and she paid them no attention.