CHAPTER THIRTEEN #5
Constance stared at Isabel, willing her to say something - anything - that might indicate what she was thinking.
Isabel had never been demonstrative, not in all the time Constance had known her, and obviously neither of them could acknowledge the truth here in this room.
Not when doing so would put Mistress Marillac's most malicious imaginings to shame.
But surely there was something to be said - something that could break apart this ridiculous lie that Isabel's niece had concocted.
Did she even believe it? Did it matter? What Hilda thought of Isabel was hardly Constance's concern - she was far more worried about wresting Isabel from her clutches, by whatever means necessary. Surely Isabel felt the same?
"What we spoke of, when last we met," Constance said, slowly, carefully, "about Walter's wardship -"
Isabel made an abortive sort of slashing gesture with her hand, a clear warning: don't. Behind her, Ellyn looked up.
Constance swallowed hard. How much Ellyn understood of the situation, she didn't know; but it seemed clear enough that her allegiance was to Mistress Marillac.
Was there anything she could say in Ellyn's presence that would not be carried back to Isabel's niece?
And she would not leave - would not grant them a single stolen moment of privacy where they could speak without concealing their meaning behind careful words.
"It is not to be thought of," Isabel said.
"I am unable, for all the reasons I explained to you before.
And even if I was able, my mistress would not hear of it.
She is - very interested in his well-being.
" Her face was very pale, but for two spots of colour high on her cheeks.
"As are my stepsons. As -" She glanced at Ellyn. "As am I."
"But -" Desperation was making Constance frantic: her heart pounded, her palms itched.
She felt as though a cord was being drawn tight around her chest, squeezing until she could not draw air into her lungs.
It was not only the thought of losing Isabel - although that in itself was a sharp, stabbing pain that would have driven her to her knees, had she not braced herself with a hand on the table - but the thought of losing Isabel like this, for such ridiculous reasons, without even trying to find another way.
There was always another way. She had to believe that.
"But - I mislike this edict of your mistress's, as if you had anything to answer for.
You and Jack have done nothing, are nothing to each other, so how may she forbid you my company on his account?
Surely she must be reasonable enough to hear sense. "
Behind Isabel, Ellyn rolled her eyes. Constance was seized with the sudden, strong urge to slap her. She was not accustomed to violence, nor did she enjoy settling disputes with brute force. But all the emotion gathering in her breast needed venting somewhere, or she would explode.
Ellyn, unfortunately, did not appear to realize this. "Don't know what you want with her company anyhow," she said, "she's a sour thing."
Constance rounded on her, her ears burning.
"You are not called upon to speak of her character," she snapped, "nor to question my -" She stopped.
She had been about to say desires, but realized just in time how it would sound.
Likely, Ellyn would not understand - in Constance's experience, few people recognized the bonds that could be formed between women like her and Isabel unless it was flaunted under their noses.
But she still couldn't take the risk. For her part, Ellyn seemed to take no notice of her abortive argument: she only tossed her head and rolled her eyes again.
When Constance looked at Isabel, she saw that her fingers were working at the hem of her apron, worrying the fabric as it unraveled.
It was the only outward sign of her distress.
"You recall," Isabel said, slow and measured, "that I spoke to you, once before, of - offers I was not free to make, which I had erred in making regardless. We were in this room, in fact."
It took Constance a moment to place the memory.
When she did, she recoiled from it: Isabel, standing just where she stood now, swaying on her feet as she stumbled through a speech she was hardly coherent enough to form.
Her haunted, hollow eyes, her attempts at holding herself upright against the onslaught of exhaustion that had driven her nearly to collapse.
"No," she said, her mouth dry, "no, Isabel you cannot mean - you did not mean -"
"I meant it then," Isabel said. "And I mean it now. I was right in what I said. You simply persuaded me otherwise for a time." She bit her lip, and it broke Constance's heart. "I wish you had not. I was more contented when I understood my lot."
Constance clenched her hands into fists behind her back.
"Were you?" she said. "I recall differently.
" She could have gone on - she wanted to go on.
She wanted to describe the Isabel she remembered from those first days of their acquaintance, the way she had shied away from honesty and flinched at gentle touch.
She wanted to set that Isabel against the one she had known in the last few weeks, who had smiled softly and let herself rest with her head on Constance's shoulder and known pleasure for the first time in her life.
She wanted to present these two Isabels to the Isabel who stood before her now, and ask if she could truly say that she had been happier before.
But she couldn't. Not only because of Ellyn, although she was certainly part of it. But she couldn't hurt Isabel and more than she'd already been hurt, was hurting. Her husband had hurt her, her niece was hurting her, everyone hurt her. Constance would not join their ranks.
She put a hand to her apron pocket, then remembered she had left her purse on the shelf under the sewing table, and went around to fetch it.
She pulled the drawstring to shake the coins into her palm, then thought better of it and stepped towards Isabel, proffering the purse.
"Your payment, then," she said. "For that last piece. "