‘That is my late niece, yes.’
Triumph soared in Gerald’s chest. Returning to Mrs Sindlesham’s chair, he held up the miniature so the face depicted there was turned towards the old lady.
‘Your niece, ma’am. And your great-niece. It might as well be Melusine herself.’
***
Martha sniffed dolefully, scrubbing at her reddened eyes with a large square of damp linen. She was sitting on the mean straw mattress that was placed on the iron bedstead in the makeshift cell, while Melusine stood with her back to the door, confronting her old nurse with the truth.
She was clad in fresh linen, but still wore the riding-habit she had appropriated, having sponged out the spots of blood late last night and left it to dry in the kitchens. She had been obliged to wait all morning for the opportunity to talk to Martha, who chose always to retire to her cell for the period of recreation that preceded afternoon prayers. Last night there had been no time. Not with the unavoidable explanations, and the need to secrete the sword and hide it before returning the priest’s horse to its stable—which had been her excuse for running from Martha’s protestations.
But today Melusine’s new-found knowledge put Martha at a disadvantage.
‘Hadn’t meant you to know,’ said the nun gruffly. ‘That’s why I never told Joan Ibstock that you were still with me when I wrote.’
‘But Marthe, this is idiot. Certainly as soon as I have found my right place at Remenham House, I must find out everything.’
‘Who was to know if you would find your place?’ countered Martha. ‘Odds were against it. Why open my mouth if there might not be a need for it when all’s said?’
Melusine acknowledged the logic of this. ‘Yes, that is reasonable. But still you have told me of my real mother when I thought it was Suzanne Valade.’
Martha looked up, belligerence in her tone. ‘Would you have me face my maker with that on my conscience? If I’d died, there’d have been no one to tell you, for your father would not have done.’
‘Certainly that is true. And Suzanne, even that she has behaved to me not at all like a mother, would also not have said.’
‘She?’ scoffed Martha. ‘Couldn’t even trouble to make a pretence of motherhood.’
Of which Melusine was only too well aware, for her stepmother had done nothing to save her from the convent.
‘What’s more,’ went on Martha, ‘I knew something Mr Charvill didn’t, or he wouldn’t so readily have left it behind him.’
‘You would speak of the house?’
‘Many’s the time little Miss Mary would say her papa meant for her to have it, she having no brothers and sisters at all—when we played together I mean, she and me and Joan Pottiswick.’
Melusine could not regard this view with anything but scepticism. ‘You think my father would not have married Suzanne if he had known? Me, I do not agree. He did not even care for his own inheritance at this place in Wodeham Water.’
She paused, holding her nurse’s eyes.
‘Don’t look at me like that,’ Martha begged. ‘Oh, dearie me, you make me feel a traitor.’
‘Only because you did not tell me entirely the story? That is silly. I would not think so of you, Marthe. You have been to me like a mother, not only a wet-nurse.’
‘Poor sort of a mother,’ Martha said with bitterness. ‘No, Melusine. You’re a lady. Me—I’m nothing but a country wench, and one who went to the bad.’
‘But this is idiot. Have you not given your life to God? Do you not repent?’ Coming to the bed, Melusine sat beside her old nurse and took hold of one of her hands. ‘And I am very glad you did this bad thing, because if not, who would take care of me?’
Martha shook her head, and Melusine spied wetness again in her eyes, although they met hers bravely. ‘You don’t know the whole, child. I’m ashamed to confess it, but I didn’t want the charge of you—a too close reminder of my own lost babe.’
Tears sprang to Melusine’s own eyes, and she clasped the hand she held more tightly. ‘But do you think I can blame you for this, Marthe?’
‘I blame myself. Oh, I grew fond of you as the years went by. But it’s love you should’ve had when you were tiny and I didn’t give it to you. Even though I knew you’d no one else to care. For that worthless father of yours—’
Melusine let go the hand only so that she might throw her own hands in the air. ‘Do not speak of him. Me, I prefer to forget that I have such a father.’ A thought caught in her mind and she turned quickly to her old nurse. ‘But there is something still I do not understand. Why did he take me?’
Martha’s damp eyes were puzzled. ‘Why?’
‘Why take me to France? Why trouble himself with me, when so easily he could leave me to this Monsieur Remenham to keep?’
To Melusine’s instant suspicion, Martha bit her lip, drew a breath, and avoided her charge’s gaze.
‘You were his daughter. He loved you.’
‘Pah! Am I a fool? Have you not this moment past said how he did not?’
Agitation sent her to her feet. How she hated talking of the man who was responsible for her being brought into the world. She paced restlessly to the door and back again, biting her tongue on the hot words begging to be uttered. But they would not be denied.
‘This is not love, Marthe. To love in such a way, it is excessively selfish.’
Leonardo had taught her that. Leonardo had taught her pretty well everything she could have need to know, when they had talked long at his bedside. His stories had enchanted her, even if in some deep corner of her heart she guessed they were not entirely true. But his life, ruled by chance and the fight to survive had appealed strongly to Melusine’s rebellious spirit. As Leonardo had himself pronounced, who better than a mountebank to teach of the perils awaiting the unwary? Who better than a wastrel to demonstrate the worth of thrift? And who could instruct better in the matter of affections than one who had thrown them away?
‘If he had loved me,’ she said, in the flat tone she had learned to use to conceal her vulnerable heart, ‘he would have left me at Remenham House to live a life of an English lady.’ The questions that had long haunted her came out at last. ‘Why did he make me French, Marthe? Why did he give me this name of Melusine, and say I am born of Suzanne Valade?’
Martha looked at her, but her lips remained firmly closed.
‘Dieu du ciel, but answer me!’
Martha’s eyes were swimming again, and she reached out. Melusine felt the calloused hand grasp around hers. ‘I’m only a poor country wench, child. I don’t understand the workings of a gentleman’s mind.’ A grimace crossed her face. ‘But you know. You know, Melusine.’
