The Last Boleyn(102)
She stared up at him. So easily accomplished? Then she hated herself for wishing he would force her. She got in, quickly pulling her chemise down to cover her knees while he watched, seemingly impassive. When he got in, the bed sagged and she almost spilled toward him.
“Goodnight, my love,” he said. “When you are in your bed safe and alone at Hever, I hope you will not have to curse these wasted hours as much as I shall and do. But if you need the time untouched, so be it.”
They lay there in the awkward silence, weary, quietly breathing. Her limbs began to ache anew from being tensed up on the narrow strip of mattress where she held herself rigidly away from him. The moonlight from the window traced its print across the bed onto the wall and still she did not doze though his deep breathing told her that he was asleep at last. Her rampant thoughts would not let her relax. The memories that tortured her were not of Will or his accusing words in his delirium, but of the passions she had felt with Staff and the hours she had treasured in bed with him, in his arms, anywhere, the past six months. An unfulfilled fire burned low and torturing in the pit of her stomach. She had only to touch him, to say his name, and awaken him, she knew, and all this terrible agony would be over. But she would never be free then, free to know that she loved him and could control her own life. The rectangle of moonlight continued its relentless path up the wall next to her. Watching it through her tears in the quiet of the inn, she fell asleep.
Staff was gone when she woke in the morning, and she was sprawled on her stomach half on his side of the mattress. She sat up, immediately wondering if she had moved this far over when he was still abed. No, surely that would have awakened her. Sunlight flooded the room making the moonlight of last night a pale memory. She quickly dressed and went to find Nancy to tie her laces. The door to the girl’s room stood ajar as did that where Stephen had slept. They could not be on the road already!
“Yer friends are gone an hour already, my lady,” came Mistress Whitman’s voice from Stephen’s room. Mary peeked around the door to see her making one of the two narrow beds in the room. “’Tis best they be early on their way, for the bands of thieves around Oxted prey on later travelers. May I help you dress, then? Your lord be having breakfast with my John. They be always talking old times on the Mary Rose, though I know yer lord was not a sailor. Sailors are very easy to spot in a crowd.” She laughed sweetly as she finished the laces.
“He is not my lord,” Mary thought to say, but she only thanked the kind woman and descended the narrow steps holding to the ship’s rigging with its intricate knots they had strung for a makeshift banister.
Staff’s eyes lit to see her. He was in a good enough mood and did not seem to hold the past night against her. Ashamed of her ravenous appetite, she nevertheless ate hot porridge, stuffed partridge and fruit, and washed it all down with ale. That amused John Whitman, and he joked that she ate like a seaman who has just come back to land. She was surprised to learn that it was nearly mid morning and scolded Staff for not waking her earlier.
“Why did you let me sleep so late?” she asked again as they went for a walk toward the heart of the little village.
“You needed it, Mary, and besides, I had the distinct impression that it would have availed me nothing to have wakened you while I was still there.”
She blushed, but laughed a bit when she saw he was teasing. She found it hard to believe that this passionate, often impatient man whose bed she had so hotly shared could have the restraint to leave her untouched as he had done. She was not certain if she were relieved or hurt.
The double doors to the little Gothic church stood open, incongruously bordered by a blacksmith’s shop on one side and the village stocks on the other. The graveyard stretched away to the side with its crooked turfy stones pointing to the sky in imitation of the tall spires so close overhead.
“May we go in, Staff? I would light a candle and pray a little while.”
He nodded and they both entered, awed to silence by the perfection of this little jewel set in the center of the crude town. Stained glass windows threw their myriad colors on the floor and the crucifix was studded with heavy semiprecious stones. Mary lit a candle, knelt at the confession rail and was amazed that Staff knelt beside her, his elbow touching hers. She prayed fervently for Will’s soul, for herself and for her son so far away. Who would tell him gently of his father’s death, and comfort him if he cried? Then the thought came to her. Perhaps on his way back to Eltham, Staff would stop at Hatfield. But dare she ask for favors when she gave none? When she finally turned her head and looked at him out of the corner of her eye, he was staring at her and a priest stood behind them.
“We are pleased to have strangers here to worship,” he said low. “Perhaps there is a special need? I did not see your horses.” His crooked smile lit his face.
“We are staying at the inn, father. We are en route to Edenbridge and stopped to see my old friend, Master Whitman.”
“Ah, yes. Not many travel the east-west road anymore. This chapel was once a pilgrim center for those on the road to Canterbury, but no more, no more. The times have changed. Bands of robbers dare to plague our roads to the south. I fear that the summer curse on London and these parts is God’s judgment on us all.”
Mary was grateful he did not ask their names or their destination in Edenbridge. If he assumed they were married, all the better. She would be ashamed to tell a man of the church otherwise. No doubt he would ask Master Whitman about them afterward, and then he would pray for their sins. If only he knew her husband was but five days dead of the sweat, he would think she were on the road to hell indeed.