A Dangerous Inheritance

‘I am just obeying my orders, Lord Herbert,’ the groom says resentfully. ‘I don’t enjoy it any more than you do, Sir.’

‘No, I don’t suppose you do,’ Harry says, more kindly. ‘The view from here is splendid,’ he adds. ‘We have been admiring it. You can see the heights of Highgate and Islington from here.’ He winks at me and I try not to giggle.

Sanders grunts, and says we should go down, and Harry, squeezing my hand and mouthing ‘I love you’, follows him, preceding me on the stairs. If only our spy had not appeared! Up in that turret room, my love awakened a need in me; I wish, how I wish, I could recapture the moment.

‘We must be getting back,’ Harry urges. ‘We have got ourselves all mucky in here, and Heaven only knows what my lady mother will say if we appear at the supper table looking like two vagrants, eh, Katherine!’

We retrace our steps through the old wing, emerging thankfully into the gilded splendour of the modern part of the house, and summoning our personal servants to attend us. It is only when I am back in my bedchamber, seated at my mirror, that I start shuddering again at the memory of that beckoning hand.

My maid comes and unlaces my gown. It is damp with sweat and dusty.

‘That’ll need sponging, my lady,’ she decrees, hanging it up on a peg. Then, as I stand there at the mirror in my petticoat, dabbing my armpits with rose water, I catch her reflection: she is looking at my skirts.

‘I see your courses have come, my lady,’ she says. ‘I’ll fetch some cloths for you.’

When she has disappeared into the i

But I mustthink of them. What if I had proved with child? Of course, I should be delighted to have a child, but it would plunge us both into awful trouble. I should have been more prudent; I should have stopped Harry from getting carried away; and yet I ca

Elegantly garbed and bejewelled, I make my way to the great parlour, where supper is to be served, and stand behind my chair as the family gathers and grace is said. I dare not meet Harry’s eyes for fear of blushing and giving myself away, and yet I can feel his admiring gaze upon me.

We sit down. The Earl lays his napkin over his shoulder, carves some meat from the serving platter and serves us, then breaks his bread. ‘I hear you two young people were exploring the York wing today,’ he says. Clearly Sanders has made his report.

‘Katherine wanted to see it,’ Harry replies easily. ‘We enjoyed looking at the old pictures, didn’t we, sweetheart?’

‘Never go there myself,’ says Pembroke. ‘One day I hope to refurbish or rebuild it, but I have extended my credit on this side of the house. I hear there was a little upset.’ He looks at me enquiringly.

‘I thought I saw a shadow on the stairs,’ I say, embarrassed in case they think me a fool. ‘It was a trick of the light or the eye, I’m sure, but it did give me a fright.’

‘We went to investigate,’ said Harry, ‘but there was no one up in the turret room. The only thing we saw was an old chest. There was no intruder hiding in it!’

‘They would have found it difficult, for that chest contains all the old records and papers from Raglan,’ his father commented. ‘I had it stored up there, out of the way. Anyway, my dear, I trust you are over your fright now.’

‘Yes, Sir, I thank you,’ I say.

‘You may have heard of Raglan Castle, Katherine,’ the Earl continues, signalling to the servants to fill the goblets. ‘It is – or was – our ancient family seat on the Welsh Marches. It was the greatest fortress of its time, and my grandfather, the first Earl, built it.’

‘It’s a mighty castle still,’ Harry says. ‘If only we still owned it!’

‘What happened?’ I ask, hoping I am not being too forward in asking.

‘My grandfather, whom men called Black William, was a staunch Yorkist,’ the Earl explained. ‘He was created Earl of Pembroke by Edward IV, and given custody of the little boy who would one day grow up to be King Henry VII. He brought him up at Raglan Castle. But during the wars between York and Lancaster, my grandfather was defeated while fighting for the King at the Battle of Edgecote, and beheaded.’

‘I’m very sorry to hear that, my lord,’ I say, looking, I hope, suitably mournful.

‘Oh, you must not fret, my dear,’ the Earl says kindly. ‘It happened more than eighty years ago. I never knew him, and my own father died when I was four. Ancient history, as they say.’

‘Black William’s son married twice, but left only a daughter, Elizabeth,’ the Countess chimes in. ‘When she married the Earl of Worcester, Raglan Castle formed part of her inheritance; and so it went out of the family.’

‘But why didn’t it pass to you, my lord, as the heir?’ I ask, puzzled.

The Earl chuckles. ‘Because I was not the heir then. I wasn’t even born. Truth to tell, my dear, my grandfather left several bastard sons, and my father was one of them. I had to make my own way in the world. It’s good service to your monarch that does that – and being a stout fighting man. I prospered under King Harry, and his son made me Earl of Pembroke, not two years since. As I was saying, my dear, that chest of papers came from Raglan Castle. I should go through it one day; one’s family history is always fascinating.’

In my lonely bed, I dream vividly of the girl in the picture, and in my dream she is beckoning me, giving me that intense, appealing look again, yet this time her face is shadowed by sadness. Even in the dream I have that sense of recognition, as if I know her from somewhere. But I can never have seen her before.

After sleeping only fitfully through the night, I am resolved. I dare not venture up there alone, but I ask Harry to accompany me to that turret room and open the chest – and he agrees. This time there will be no snatched moments, for Sanders insists on accompanying us. No doubt he told the Earl how we gave him the slip yesterday.

I approach the dark passageway with trepidation, scarcely daring to look ahead of me at the wall of the stairwell, and reminding myself that I have two strong men with me. But today there is nothing there. We mount the stairs, and then Harry and I sink to our knees by the chest, while Sanders perches on the top stair, balancing an account book on his knees, seemingly absorbed in checking his columns of figures.

Harry snatches a kiss behind his back, runs his fingers up my arm and allows them to stray for a moment to my breast, then grins mischievously at me as he unlocks the chest. The old lid creaks as he raises it, and the dry, musty smell of long-forgotten documents is released. There are piles and bundles of them to be gone through: deeds, grants, warrants, formal letters, a treatise on hunting (‘I’ll keep that,’ Harry says), a crumbling missal with faded pages, broken seals, a long scroll bearing a family tree, plans of Raglan Castle on brittle parchment, a tattered heraldic ba

But wait a minute!