Chapter Seven
The walk to Mrs Aisling’s quarters was not particularly strenuous.
The crone contrived for it to be so, wanting to be closest to the Stanleys.
Frivolous ambition too often took hold of women, who were left to grasp at monotonies.
So long as one woman could lord over the other, no one remained unscathed.
Though he’d be penalised if seen, Dermot went by way of the masters’ staircase.
The Stanley portraits were positioned just a few inches above him as he climbed, always to sneer at the man who dared stand beneath.
Each one depicted a man black of hair with fair skin, his dark eyes piercing and levelled at the observer.
He glimpsed each one, thinking on how many great men languished in their graves while these lords etched themselves into everyone’s nightmares.
Stomping down the stairs, Dermot walked with as much conviction in that moment as Lord Robert in any.
The degradation of the walls grated on him, some stones growing green.
It was said the lords of their isle were the poorest in the kingdom, and it was they who experienced it firsthand in the servants’ quarters.
Making his way to Mrs Aisling’s door, he stood peaceably as he waited.
Not even she could cast a shadow on the devils he’d just left.
‘Ma’am, someone knocked,’ a feminine voice called, and such was the thinness of the walls that Dermot heard her plain.
There was an immediate bang from inside, the beating of a hand against wood. ‘Stupid girl. Do you think me deaf? See who it is!’
Immediately the door opened to reveal a slight, blonde girl who Dermot knew as one of Will’s companions.
Her curls went almost to her midriff, striking in a way only a man disinterested in the female form could appreciate.
Hazel eyes were cast down and shrouded by thick lashes, leaving no doubt as to the purpose behind Will’s pursuits.
‘Sir,’ the girl said, barely audible.
Mrs Aisling stood. She removed her spectacles and placed them on a piece of fabric to her side.
Then, to Dermot’s astonishment, she procured another pair and fit them on her nose.
As she adjusted them, she said, ‘Do you think him a proper young man like our Lord Robert? Sir! Never have I heard the like. He is your equal.’ She came closer, squinting despite the enhancement.
‘These blasted girls do work me up. Whatever do you want at such an hour, dear?’
Dermot hesitated. Such a request would not be made by a sane man, though he supposed he’d long given up that pretence. Noelle was the woman he was looking for. She, at least, seemed the least flighty.
‘It’s just that…’ Dermot began, unsure.
‘Do mind yourself. Coming to my office at such an hour! Whatever can be the matter? Do hurry up, else I’ll have to report this to Mr Béchard.
You mustn’t think me unaware of you manservants skulking around my girls,’ Mrs Aisling said, incomprehensible to everyone but herself.
It was this impotent rage that made him weary of women.
A man in power might commit great evils but it was woman who doused the world in misery.
‘It is the witchfinder,’ Dermot said, delighting in the way Mrs Aisling shivered. ‘He says he can’t examine the female prisoner without a woman. He wants one of the maids.’
Mrs Aisling near dropped, steadying herself only at the last minute with a chair reserved for one of the maids. The housekeeper’s underlings, Dermot realised, had to contend with seats fit to break the back for their needlework.
‘Did I hear you correctly?’ Mrs Aisling said. ‘Why, shouldn’t I go?’
Beset as he was by lunatics, Dermot shook his head. ‘I don’t think you would like it in the dungeon, Mrs Aisling.’
Righting herself as she realised she was not one of the chosen, Mrs Aisling said, ‘I don’t imagine my legs could carry me down. And seeing those filthy prisoners would disturb me. That Lord Robert should go near such violent, evil people! That poor man.’
‘Is Noelle here?’ Dermot asked.
‘Dear me, no! Lord Tristan needed something or other done upstairs, I can’t recall what,’ Mrs Aisling said.
No movement betrayed this lie, only her constant squint.
She tilted her chin, doubtless realising he guessed the implication, and smiled as though she were a saint.
‘Go on then, take Amy with you. But mind your manners in front of the gentleman witchfinder, girl. Not one man down there cares to look at you!’
Unable to stomach it, Dermot inched away. He could not bear anyone who conducted humiliations in public. Too many times had Will and Stephen been witnesses to Béchard’s outbursts, and it made him all the angrier.
‘I…’ a feminine voice came, startling Dermot from his trance. He had been recalling the time Béchard struck him in the head with a pan. ‘Am I really to go down with you?’ Amy said.
‘I wanted to ask Noelle,’ Dermot blurted. So rarely did he speak to women that he started walking up the stairs. It only occurred to him halfway that it would’ve been quicker to go down and use the door to the side.
‘I am sorry,’ Dermot said. He watched her smooth her blonde locks into place as they walked the length of the ramparts, and when they came to the stairs he stood to the side so she could go down first.
‘Oh!’ Amy cried. ‘Poor Noelle. You needn’t apologise, this is my doing!’
Hurrying down after her, he put a finger to his mouth, cautious of any would-be spies.
‘You are right,’ Amy said. ‘Tristan came for me, you see. But Noelle, seeing me in such a state, did go with him. But I didn’t ask her to!’
He suspected this was a usual occurrence with the maids. Mrs Aisling likely viewed it as tacit approval of her girls, and now Béchard sat in the kitchen comprehending the same thing.
‘I understand you,’ Dermot said.
‘Oh, but I think you don’t,’ Amy said, and Dermot paused at such a meek girl challenging him. ‘How can you understand? Have you had some lech drooling over you as you start a fire, covered in soot and face red from heat? And you can’t say no, else you and your mother would starve?’
‘Do you not do the same with Will?’ Dermot said. They were coming to the courtyard. He knew this only by the blistering gale that hit him, which at least numbed his burning cheeks.
Amy hastened to meet him, blocking his way.
She confronted him in the manner of a woman safe in the knowledge it would not come to blows.
‘And I suppose you men can’t tell one woman from the other, so if an old hag wanted to bed you it would be no matter.
You pull a girl apart for the slightest fault and speak to me as if a woman would have a man whose features she does not like by choice!
Why, yes, I would go to bed with Will, but you? Never.’
Struck by this, Dermot ran his hand along the cold railing.
He had been much cheered by Maldred’s attentions.
Such an ethereal beauty serving him brought about all sorts of delusions, even the conquest of Thorne.
And, having always entertained the idea of bedding Aubrey, he perhaps came to believe himself capable of the feat. To hear a woman speak so was damning.
Sighing, Amy said, ‘It’s just… poor Noelle. I had not asked her to do it, never would I wish such a thing on her. And now here I am, to go down with you to the dungeon while she suffers up there.’ She kept walking and Dermot could do nothing but follow, disgruntled but at least cooled by the wind.
‘She is my dearest friend,’ Amy continued.
After what had been said, Dermot did not care to listen. He quickened his pace so she would be forced to hurry after. Striving to recover his dignity, he said, ‘Tristan is not bad looking.’
The guards would certainly hear them coming, odious men that they were.
They did not count as staff, instead they were Robert’s dogs brought from the mainland.
Seeing themselves as superior, they bullied any man in their way and were hot to run for Robert with any complaint, even if it was a look that lasted too long.
Dermot had long been wary of them and kept his head down as they came into view.
‘Not bad looking,’ Amy echoed. ‘Well, why didn’t you tell us maids you thought so? All this time you could’ve been doing the bending over.’
It was said too close to the guards. Dermot put a hand to his cheek and near burnt his palm.
‘Rare to see a woman so lovely in these parts,’ one of the guards said.
Neither seemed to have heard Amy’s remark, which brought Dermot some relief.
Never had he fantasised about being bedded; that was for the likes of Aubrey.
But still his cock stirred as he thought on how Tristan’s long hair might be used for mastery.
Surely an unexpected pull would elicit a cry.
Such a wanton creature could easily be tamed, be there a man strong enough to do it.
‘A woman at his side and away in fairyland, he is! Damn these kitchen staff. Great fools and more trouble than they’re worth,’ the man to the right said.
‘They get all Lord Stanley’s scraps,’ the first said. It was then Dermot noticed the man was leering at him, and he was only pacified when he realised Amy had gone to stand behind him. Certainly he had no designs on any guard. They were mere hounds itching to lick Robert’s boots.
‘Would you open the hatch?’ Dermot said, and for some unfathomable reason this made them laugh.
‘Lord Robert has already gone down with the witchfinder,’ the second began. His admiration was so apparent that Dermot thought him either demented or infatuated. ‘He told us to wait for you, else I wouldn’t lower myself to talking to a kitchen boy.’