Alice in Love and War (16 page)

“Now, Lisi…” said Nia.

And Alice told them everything that had happened to her since they were separated in November: about Copsey, and the inn, Robin, the loss of her baby, and the kind treatment she’d had at Weston Hall.

“Oh!” Nia was almost in tears. “To be all alone in such trouble! If only we’d been together.”

Bronwen was furious, shocked by Robin’s behaviour. “He
left
you?” she exclaimed. “How
could
he? When you were carrying his child?”

“He said he’d come back. But he never did. I suppose he was tired of me.” She found that a hard thing to admit, after the love they’d shared. “But, Bronwen, I don’t
know
. Perhaps something prevented him. You’ve not seen him, I suppose?”

“No. Not yet. But he should have got word to you, no matter what.”

“Perhaps he couldn’t,” said Alice. “Perhaps…”

The possibility that Robin might be dead hung, unspoken, in the air between them.

“He will have come here today,” said Bronwen, “if he is coming at all.”

“Yes.” Alice could suddenly hardly breathe at the thought that he might be near, that she might soon see him again. Her heart was in confusion, full of anger, fear and bewilderment. She would not know what to feel until she knew why he had left her.

“You were lucky to be taken in at that big house,” Nia said later, when they were alone together. “And they asked you to stay on?”

“Yes. But I wanted to see
you
. I missed you. I wanted to be with you when your baby was born.”

Nia’s eyes glittered again with tears. She could never hide her feelings. She said, “It won’t be long. I’ve been getting pains already.”

“And are you well? Happy?”

“I’m frightened,” said Nia. “Happy, yes, but afraid of what is to come. I’m glad you’re here, Lisi – very glad.”

Alice feared that too much confidence was being placed in her, but then she remembered how, at Weston Hall, she had seemed to have an instinct for healing. She said, “I’ve brought some remedies with me – dried raspberry leaves and some other things that Mistress Christian recommended. So I can make you tisanes to ease your labour. And there’s this…”

She reached into her pocket and brought out a tiny linen drawstring bag. Inside it was a stone: oval, polished smooth, its colour red, streaked with veins of grey. She put it in Nia’s hand. “Shake it.”

Nia did so, and the stone rattled. Her eyes widened. “What’s in there?”

“Another stone, I believe. It grows inside – a stone within a stone. It’s called an eagle stone. Mistress Christian gave it to me. She said it can prevent miscarriage, and will also ensure an easier birth if it’s placed on the thigh during labour.”

She watched as Nia examined the stone. Nia’s hands were small and squarish, with short fingers. The stone fitted comfortably into her palm.

Alice said, “Christian told me her cousin, Lady Grace, used such a stone during each of her labours, and her pain was always much eased.”

“I can feel the power in it,” said Nia, curling her fingers around the stone. “The lady was good to give it to you. It must be very rare and costly.”

Alice saw that the eagle stone was already having a good effect on Nia. She wondered, briefly, if it could be like her father’s dried turtle, a mere talisman; but the stone had been tried with success by other women, and Christian had assured her of its virtues. She certainly intended to use it herself if she ever had need.

“Have you been taking raspberry leaf tea, as I told you?” she asked.

“I have, but it’s all gone now.” Nia kept turning the stone around, looking at it, and shaking it. It had a pleasing rattle. She passed it back to Alice. “Keep this safe.”

“I will. And I’ll make some raspberry leaf tea. You can drink it now.”

She rummaged in her pack, glad to be doing this. It took her mind off Robin, the thought of whom was unsettling. But later, when Bryn, Edryd and Gethin and the other Welshmen began to arrive, she found she was heart in mouth, half expecting to look up and see Robin strolling towards her with his long, easy stride and his warm smile, coming to fetch her as if nothing had happened. She joined her Welsh friends at their evening meal, all the time alert and watching for him, but he never came.

He has left me, she thought. Or he is dead.

The evening was light. They sat singing and telling jokes and stories around the campfire. Alice understood little. Even the bit of Welsh she had learned last year seemed to have deserted her. She felt cut off, lonely and out of place, and began to regret that she had ever left Weston Hall. Perhaps, she thought, once Nia has had her baby, I should go back there.

Nia noticed, and touched her arm. “I’m happy to see you again, Lisi. We all are.”

Alice nodded, grateful. Nia’s sympathy made her want to cry. She wished she could take Nia to Weston with her for the birth. Her friend would be better cared for there. But when she spoke this thought aloud Nia said, “Oh, no! I wouldn’t be easy in that grand house! And I’d never leave Bryn.”

Dusk fell, and they went to their billets. Her friends were in a large barn, and Bryn found Alice a space near by. Alice curled up, using her pack as a pillow and wrapping her cloak around her. Despite Bryn’s kindness, she felt wide awake and vulnerable. Some of the Welshmen had already noticed that she was alone, and she was aware of them watching her. When they spoke and smiled together, glancing her way, she felt afraid, not knowing what they said, whether they might be making lewd comments about her.

In the morning the drums called them all to their quarters, the colours were raised, and they marched. They were heading north-west, and as Alice followed she knew she was moving further and further away from Weston Hall and any possibility of returning there. In a few hours they reached their destination: a town on a hilltop, at a junction of many roads. Alice had seen its name on a milestone: Stow-on-the-Wold. Other forces were already assembled there, and she heard later that they had been joined by Prince Rupert’s army.

Everyone is here now, she thought. And if Robin is still in the king’s army, he will be here, or I’ll get news of him. But even though the Welsh soldiers came early to find their womenfolk, Robin did not appear. Alice began to realize that she might never find out what had happened, that perhaps it was better to forget him. She had learned valuable skills from Christian Aubrey – enough, she believed, to find work and support herself. She would not go looking for Robin.

But then, as she and the other women were starting up the cooking fires, she saw Gethin, Rhian’s husband, approach and speak to his wife. The two of them glanced across at her.

“What is it?” she asked, scrambling to her feet.

Rhian came over. “Gethin’s seen your man – Robin.”

Alice felt her heart begin to pound.

“Over there, by those wagons.” Rhian pointed. “You’ll catch him if you go now.”

Alice hesitated. “I … I don’t know… I think perhaps…”

“Go on!” said Rhian, giving her a little push. “I’ll do the fire.”

The others were listening now, and joined in.

“You go, Alice! Make him answer some questions!” urged Bronwen.

And Nia said, “You’ll have no peace otherwise.”

That was true. Alice moved away from the fire, towards the place Rhian had pointed out. Her mouth felt dry, and she was trembling. She half hoped that Gethin had been mistaken, or that Robin would be gone, that she need not confront him.

But he was there. She came upon him – upright and handsome as ever – standing with his two friends, Will and Jacob. They were talking animatedly. The sight of Robin’s once-loved profile made her catch her breath. She almost turned and ran, but Will had seen her. His manner at once became guarded, and Robin, sensing some change, turned round.

“Alice.” He did not smile, and he looked both surprised and wary.

Will and Jacob tactfully moved away.

Robin said, “Alice, I didn’t expect… There was no child, then?”

“There was. It died.” She did not try to soften the news. “I miscarried.”

“I am sorry. Sorry to hear it.”

“Are you? You did not come to enquire after me. Robin, I waited. All winter. I waited so long. You never came to the inn, or to Weston Hall. Why didn’t you come back for me? Why did you desert me?”

Her voice had risen, and others were beginning to stare. He touched her then, for the first time: took her by the upper arm and led her away to a more private place between two of the wagons.

“I was not able to come,” he said. “I left you money—”

“Money!” she exclaimed. “I wanted
you
, not your money. I woke up and found you gone: no address, nothing. And the girls, Sib and Nell; they were cruel to me and said you’d found someone else, and then” – despite her determination, her voice broke – “the baby…”

“Shh, shh.” He patted her shoulder, looking around uneasily. “I am sorry. There was nothing I could do.”

“But you said you’d come back! I believed we’d be married. You promised, Robin.”

His gaze slid away from her. She saw he wanted nothing more than to be gone. “I’m sorry, Alice,” he repeated. “Sorry about the child, and your troubles. You have enough money?”

“It’s not the money. You said you’d marry me.”

“I never said that! I said I’d see about it.” He would not look at her. “The truth is I can’t marry you.”

“Can’t?”

“Alice, I’m already married.”

She stepped back, stunned, the breath knocked out of her. She thought at first that he meant he had found another girl and married her that winter, but then he continued, speaking hurriedly. “I had to go home. My wife was with child, expected to be brought to bed around Christmastide…”

His wife
. His wife who had been with child. She must have been already more than five months gone with child when Alice and Robin met at Tor Farm. He’d spent the previous winter with his wife, made love to her, made her pregnant, then gone off on campaign and found Alice, desperate to get away from home, foolish enough to trust him.

Alice breathed in to steady herself. All her dreams of love were shattered, revealed as a sham. He had never loved her. She was nothing to him. She felt hollow.

“I thought you’d guess,” he said, with a trace of irritation. “I meant you to guess, when I left you.”

Why had she never guessed? She was such a fool! But he’d been so loving all those weeks; and besides, he was very young to be married. No doubt that was why none of her friends had thought of it either.

“Do you love her?” she asked faintly. “Did you always love her, and not me?”

“Of course I loved you!” he replied with warmth, looking at her reproachfully. “I was married young. Eighteen. Susan, my wife, is a neighbour’s daughter. When she found she was with child our fathers made sure we were married. You know I work for my father; he gave us a cottage, saw to everything.”

Alice remembered how he had told her his parents were indulgent. Yes, they would arrange everything. But – a thought struck her. He’d been married three, maybe four years. So this child, the one he went home for…

“It’s your
second
child,” she said.

“Yes. There are two now.”

Married, and with two children. Alice had been simply a girl to pass the time with while he was on campaign; and when she became a nuisance he had left her.

“You betrayed me,” she said.

He looked hurt. “I never asked you to come with me! You threw yourself at me, begged me to take you. What was I to do?”

“You could have told me the truth.”

“I didn’t have the heart.”

“You didn’t have the courage.”

“Alice,” he coaxed. “Let’s not quarrel. Can’t we kiss and be friends?” He tried to draw her towards him, but she sprang away.

“Don’t touch me! Keep your hands for your wife!”

And she turned her back on him and left.

“You’re well rid of him,” said Nia.

And Rhian said, “Who’d have thought it, though? He seemed so fond of you.”

“Perhaps he was, in his way,” said Bronwen.

“What will you do?” asked Nia. “Will you want to go home?”

“To Tor Farm? Never. And there is no real home for me at Weston Hall, even if I could get there.” She realized now that Lady Weston had been right: it would not be safe to travel alone, especially in this time of war. Tomorrow the army was heading further north-west. She could not imagine moving against that tide. And Nia’s baby would be born any day now. “I’ll stay with you,” she said. “If you’ll have me.”

“You know we will.”

That night, lying awake in a shared shelter, with people snuffling, snoring and whispering all around her, Alice thought back over her time with Robin and saw how she had deceived herself. It was she who had asked to go with him; she who spoke of love and marriage. He’d made no promises, ever. He was merely passing through. All he had wanted was a few nights of love on Dartmoor; he’d never intended to take her with him. No wonder he had been so uneasy as the army drew ever closer to Oxford, to his home. He must have been wondering, all that time, what to do about her. And that letter, the one he’d hidden away: that was probably from his wife, telling him how she missed him, filling him with guilt towards both women.

A thought came to her then, and she told Nia in the morning.

“I’ve still got most of the money he gave me. I ought to give it back.” Her pride, she felt, would not allow her to keep it. She said passionately, “I’ll
throw
it back at him!”

“I’d hold on to it, Lisi,” said Nia. “You don’t want to go throwing money about. You might need it.”

Over the next few days, Nia and the others watched over Alice, sympathized and advised. She knew from the looks on people’s faces that word of her confrontation with Robin must have spread quickly. A few of the young unattached Welsh soldiers now smiled and, she felt, regarded her speculatively. Well, she could do worse. They were good-hearted boys, and handsome, some of them. But she didn’t want another man, not yet. She was too hurt, too shamed. She felt like an injured animal that wants only to hide away and lick its wounds.