Lady of the English - By Elizabeth Chadwick Page 0,196

he knew he was bidding farewell to something he would never have again. He cupped her face and stroked it for the last time. Her skin was still smooth despite her five and forty years. All the damage was on the inside.

“I have something for you,” he said. “Something I want you to remember me by when you pray because we can be together in God if nowhere else.” Opening her right hand, he placed in it a string of rock crystal prayer beads, adorned by a cross set with red gemstones, and then closed her fingers over it. “The bible says that a virtuous wife is more precious than rubies,” he said hoarsely. “I will love and honour you all the days of my life, no matter how long I live.”

She looked down at his gift, and then up into his eyes. “You have enriched me beyond all material wealth. I will love you all the days of my life also.”

They stood together, their hands still linked and their bodies lightly touching. He remembered the time he had first knelt to her at court when she came to marry Henry: a slim, lithe girl, her eyes filled with fear and touching bravery. He had been a couple of years older than her, but still very much a junior member of the court. That first sight of her had struck a pang in his heart because he thought her perfection. So modest and gentle, but with an underlying strength and refined poise. To have her as his wife and give him children of her womb had been living a dream, and now he was waking up and it was bitter. This was the last time, the last touch. When he returned to Arundel, and sat by the fireside, he would be alone. He had sat thus on many occasions, but this time it would mean 485

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something different and he would have to deal with it well, for the sake of the future, and the six beautiful children Adeliza had borne to him of her grace.

In the final moment, Adeliza continued to hold his hand, even though she knew she had to let him go and release them both. In some ways it would be easier to be apart from him, because his need for her to get better on top of her illness had been so hard to bear. At Afflighem she could have peace and tranquillity. She was going to miss him desperately. His admiration for her and his need had always been balm for her soul.

Making a supreme effort, she disengaged and turned to the waiting children. They were lined up with their nurses, descending in height from oldest to youngest. Wilkin, so much like his father, tall and strong for his age with a mass of brown curls and golden-hazel eyes. Adelis, save for her fair hair was like Will too, robust and strong, and she was glad to see that trait in her eldest daughter, for it would stand her in good stead. Godfrey and Reiner, fair and slender, like her brother and father, and the youngest children, still folded in their infant pudginess. They would not remember her except through the stories of others.

She fixed them all with a long look as if she could burn them into her mind’s eye and make them as indelible in her sight as they were in her heart. She had given each child something to remember her by. There were books for the oldest boys and rings to be set by until when they were men; rings that one day they might pass on to their wives or daughters if God was merciful. Her jewelled belts had gone to her daughters. She had given Adelis the gown in which she had married Will, and waiting for Agatha was a magnificent court dress crusted with pearls and rock crystals.

“Be good for your father,” she said as she kissed each child in turn. Little Henry was held in his nurse’s arms because 486

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Adeliza did not have the strength to hold him herself. Agatha reached up a chubby hand to grasp Adeliza’s hand. “Mama,” she said. “Mama.”

Adeliza closed her eyes. “Bless you,” she whispered. “Bless you all the days of your life.” She stooped to kiss Agatha’s small fingers, curled them over the love, and turned away.

Agatha began to wail, as if knowing instinctively that her mother was not coming back,