CHAPTER THIRTEEN #2
"Oh, I don't speak of her," Hilda said. "I meant you.
For how else am I to refer to the sort of woman who abandons her child for hours at a time go to and carry on with a man to whom she has no marriage contract?
And with her own husband hardly a year in his grave.
I cannot think what Uncle Geoffrey would say if he could see you now. "
Had the situation not been so dire, Isabel might have been tempted to laugh.
The accusation was too ridiculous. "You think I've been passing my time at the tailor's shop to carry out assignations with Master Rykener's brother-in-law?
I've met the man all of twice. And I take Walter to his aunt and uncle's so that he may visit with his little cousin. He has no playmates here."
"It is difficult to take you at your word," Ancelin said, "when you have already misled us so thoroughly as to the ways you pass your time."
"Misled you?" Isabel repeated. "I've never done anything of the sort. You never asked -"
"We never thought there was a need," Hilda said.
There was an uglier twist to her face now, and Isabel thought she understood: Hilda had believed Isabel entirely under her thumb.
It must have been a nasty shock to her to realize that Isabel had a life outside of Hilda's demands, perhaps even one she was happy in.
That was something Hilda could not abide.
"But it seems clear to me now that you are less the woman I thought you were, and far less than my uncle believed you to be.
Ralf and Piers had told me as much many times, but I paid it no mind, for I am no gossip.
Now I see my mistake. A woman of your sort has no business raising a child -"
"What?" If Isabel had not already been sitting down, she was quite sure her legs would have buckled beneath her.
"- and certainly none raising two young ladies of good breeding," Hilda went on.
"My husband and I agreed to keep you under our roof as a kindness, and you have betrayed our trust entirely.
We ought to have turned you out the moment we arrived and hired on a proper nursemaid for Walter, but we thought it best that a child so young not be taken from his mother.
Now I see he would be far better off removed from your influence. "
"No!" Isabel stood so quickly, the stool she'd been sitting on toppled over. "He needs me. He's never known anything else -"
"All the better to remove you now," Ancelin said over her, "before any bad habits have the opportunity to set in."
"I am his mother," Isabel said. She was near tears, and could no more have concealed that fact than she could have taken wing and flown.
"I have had him in my care from the day he was born.
He has never been away from my side for more than a few hours.
A nursemaid would not know how to soothe him, how to nurse him when he takes ill, how to be certain he finishes his meals and sleeps through the night. You cannot take him from me -"
"We can," Hilda said. "According to the terms of my uncle's will. If Ralf and Piers agree, then we may do as we like." Her smile was sickening. "And I doubt very much that you would be able to persuade them otherwise."
"Please," Isabel said past the swelling in her throat.
"I'll do as you like, stay where you tell me - but please, don't take him away from me.
He needs me." She was thinking of the night before, how he'd cried at the storm until she comforted him.
How she'd paced their small room all week when he'd been sick, feeling his small arms wrapped around her neck as he wheezed, sitting up to make sure he could breathe all through the night.
What nursemaid would do that for him? How would she know that he needed rocking to sleep at night, or that he'd bolt across the street if he saw an animal he wished to pet, or how he was accustomed to bread and butter between meals?
What woman, hired on by Hilda, would protect him from his cousins' sharp words?
And even if a kind nursemaid could be found, how could she explain to him why she was being torn from his side with no notice or reason? He'd think she abandoned him.
"It seems to me you need him far more than he needs you," Ancelin said, but his mien was not so cruel as Hilda's.
He was not - based on Isabel's limited experience of him - motivated by spite; rather, he hardly seemed to care how his household was run, so long as he did not need to be bothered with it.
If either of them could be swayed, it would be him.
"I say again," Isabel said, addressing herself directly to Ancelin, "I will do whatever you ask - but please, do not take my son from me. No demands would be too great, if it would prevent that. I know I have no right to him by law. I can only throw myself upon your mercy to be permitted to stay."
Ancelin looked at her, and then at Hilda.
Isabel chanced a look at her, too: her expression was calculating.
"If we were to acquiesce," she said, "it would be necessary for us to keep you close to home.
You have proven yourself untrustworthy, and so you cannot be permitted your liberty to go about as you have been.
You will only go where I send you, and Bridget or Ellyn must accompany you to market and back.
" Her eyes gleamed. "And you will not return to this tailor's shop, of course.
Your remaining in this household will require an assurance of good conduct. "
"Anything," Isabel said again. "Anything you ask.
" She could not think about what Hilda had said; she couldn't think about what it meant.
She could only say and do whatever it took to extract a promise that Walter would not be taken away from her.
Her chest felt tight; her fingers were tingling as if they'd gone numb.
Her head was swimming. She would do whatever she had to in order to survive this. Anything. Anything. Anything.
Then a horrible thought struck her. "Where is Walter now? Where have you sent him?"
Hilda rolled her eyes. "To the kitchen, as you well know. Ellyn is watching him."
But Ellyn had been the one following her; Ellyn had reported her comings and goings for weeks; Ellyn obeyed Hilda, not her.
And clearly Hilda had been giving her instructions that Isabel had never heard or noticed.
If she had told Ellyn to take him out while Isabel was distracted, to make sure he was gone before she knew -
"Then I ask your permission to go to him," she said. Her breath was coming so quickly, it was hard to take in enough air to speak. "If this matter is resolved and you are satisfied with my promises, I would see my son."
Ancelin shrugged. "Your promises matter little. As my wife has said, we will ensure for ourselves that your behaviour is acceptable." He returned his gaze to the parchment in front of him. "But as you have agreed to our terms, you are free to go."
"And go up to the girls' room once you've fetched Walter," Hilda added, "they've not yet practiced their madrigals today."
Hilda had hardly finished her sentence before Isabel was tearing out of the room and down the passageway, all dignity forgotten.
She was chilled to the bone and shaking; it was a small miracle that she was even able to hold herself upright, much less run.
Walter should be in the kitchen - he was probably in the kitchen - but if he wasn't, if Isabel had handed him to Ellyn and she'd taken him away and she had no way of knowing where or how to get him back -
She heard her son cry, and the sound provided a burst of energy that carried her to the end of the passageway and into the kitchen.
Walter was sitting on the wooden bench next to the table, flailing and howling as Ellyn tried and failed to wrap him in a blanket.
She looked up when Isabel came hurtling in, and stepped back from Walter, throwing her hands up.
"Finally! You take him, he'll have none of me. "
Isabel did not pause to answer. She snatched Walter up off the bench and fairly crushed him against her chest, burying her face in his hair.
He was still damp from his bath, red-faced from his tantrum, but he quieted almost as soon as she picked him up.
"I'm here," she said, her voice muffled.
"I'm here. I'm here. It's all right. I'm here. "
"Brat," Ellyn muttered, moving around to the other side of the table and taking up a knife to resume chopping the turnips that were strewn over the tabletop.
Ordinarily, Isabel would have snapped at her, but she was too weak with relief to bother.
She picked up the blanket instead, and draped it over Walter's shoulders, a compromise he seemed to find more acceptable than being swaddled.
If Hilda got rid of her and hired on a nursemaid instead, would she insist on swaddling him over his objections?
Ellyn certainly felt no compunction over it.
Such a tiny thing, only a preference, but it mattered to him.
And she was the only one who cared, the only one who would see that he was happy and comfortable and safe.
She raised her eyes from Walter to Bet, who was stirring a pot over the fire and watching Isabel with a wary look. Isabel shifted Walter in her arms, feeling her chest tighten. "Did you know?" she said.
Bet shrugged, looking back down at her stewpot. "They were discussing it last night over supper."
"Discussing what?" Ellyn said behind her, but Isabel had no interest in remaining to hear Bet explain.
She carried Walter out into the passageway, kicking the door shut behind her, and sank down onto a bench.
She was shaking, her heart hammering. Walter seemed to sense her distress, for he reared back in her arms and reached up to pat her face.
She kissed his forehead, then pulled him close, rocking him.