hastily.
Ralph left her and went upstairs.
Philippa was on the bed, sitting upright with her back against the headboard. She had taken off her shoes but was otherwise fully dressed. She stared accusingly at Ralph as he walked in.
He said: "You have no right to be angry with me!"
"I'm not angry," she said. "But you are."
She could always twist words around so that she was in the right and he in the wrong.
Before he could think of a reply, she said: "Wouldn't you like me to leave you?"
He stared at her, astonished. This was the last thing he had expected. "Where would you go?"
"Here," she said. "I won't become a nun, but I could live in the convent nevertheless. I would bring just a few servants: a maid, a clerk and my confessor. I've already spoken to Mother Caris, and she is willing."
"My last wife did that. What will people think?"
"A lot of noblewomen retire to nunneries, either temporarily or permanently, at some point in their lives. People will think you've rejected me because I'm past the age for conceiving children - which I probably am. Anyway, do you care what people say?"
The thought briefly flashed across his mind that he would be sorry to see Gerry lose Odila. But the prospect of being free of Philippa's proud, disapproving presence was irresistible. "All right, what's stopping you? Tilly never asked permission."
"I want to see Odila married first."
"Who to?"
She looked at him as if he were stupid.
"Oh," he said. "Young David, I suppose."
"He is in love with her, and I think they would be well suited."
"He's under age - he'll have to ask the king."
"That's why I've raised it with you. Will you go with him to see the king, and speak in support of the marriage? If you do this for me, I swear I will never ask you for anything ever again. I will leave you in peace."
She was not asking him to make any sacrifices. An alliance with Monmouth could do Ralph nothing but good. "And you'll leave Earlscastle, and move into the nunnery?"
"Yes, as soon as Odila is married."
It was the end of a dream, Ralph realized, but a dream that had turned into a sour, bleak reality. He might as well acknowledge the failure and start again.
"All right," he said, feeling regret mingled with liberation. "It's a bargain."
Chapter 77
Easter came early in the year 1350, and there was a big fire blazing in Merthin's hearth on the evening of Good Friday. The table was laid with a cold supper: smoked fish, soft cheese, new bread, pears and a flagon of Rhenish wine. Merthin was wearing clean underclothes and a new yellow robe. The house had been swept, and there were daffodils in a jug on the sideboard.
Merthin was alone. Lolla was with his servants, Arn and Em. Their cottage was at the end of the garden but Lolla, who was five, loved to stay there overnight. She called it going on pilgrimage, and took a travelling bag containing her hair brush and a favourite doll.
Merthin opened a window and looked out. A cold breeze blew across the river from the meadow on the south side. The last of the evening was fading, the light seeming to fall out of the sky and sink into the water, where it disappeared in the blackness.
He visualized a hooded figure emerging from the nunnery. He saw it tread a worn diagonal across the cathedral green, hurry past the lights of the Bell and descend the muddy main street, the face shadowed, speaking to no one. He imagined it reaching the foreshore. Did it glance sideways into the cold black river, and remember a moment of despair so great as to give rise to thoughts of self-destruction? If so, the recollection was quickly dismissed, and it stepped forward on to the cobbled roadbed of his bridge. It crossed the span and made landfall again on Leper Island. There it diverted from the main road and passed through low shrubbery, across scrubby grass cropped by rabbits, and around the ruins of the old lazar house until it came to the south-west shore. Then it tapped on Merthin's door.
He closed the window and waited. No tap came. He was wishfully a little ahead of schedule.
He was tempted to drink some wine, but he did not: a ritual had developed, and he did not want to change the order of events.
The knock came a few moments later. He opened the