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She was very pleased with my marriage. She had become convinced that it was right for me, in spite of its begi
“Colum and Jake,” she said, “are of a kind and that is the kind of man women like us need. It is good when one can look back and say this and that happened for the best.”
“It seems so strange to me that a year ago I did not know Colum,” I marvelled.
“Time in such matters is not important. I can see you are happy.”
“Yet how much you wanted me to marry Fe
“You would have had a peaceful life with him, but perhaps a dull one.”
“When is he to marry?”
“In September.”
“How strange that such a man should so quickly make up his mind.”
“I gather from his mother that he has known this Mistress Lee for many years. They have been childhood friends. Of course he was fond of you; he wanted to marry you; and it was ideal too in view of the amalgamation. But when you married he renewed his friendship with Mistress Lee. Their families are pleased about it and it seems a suitable match.”
“They hope to start trading next year,” she told me. “It is amazing how long these matters take to arrange. Your father chafes against delay. You know what an impatient man he is. I am sure it is the thought of getting the better of the Spaniards that makes him so pleased with the venture.”
“But the Spaniards are finished.”
My mother looked slightly worried. “I am not so sure. Admiral Drake has taken out a fleet of men-o’-war and attacked towns in Spain and Portugal. Why should he do that if they were so defeated? Why should he feel it necessary to give them another blow? I heard before I left that over a thousand gentlemen accompanied him and that only just over three hundred returned. Then our men have seized sixty ships in the Tagus which belonged to the Hanse towns there. It was found that these ships contained stores to fit out a fleet to come against us.”
“My father and Colum think that the Spaniard has been beaten for ever.”
“I ca
“Have you tried it?”
“I have not seen it yet. It has only just been brought to England. But I intend to at the first opportunity.”
And so we walked and passed our days most happily, for she had brought with her not only the clothes she had made for my baby and new recipes for my tasting, but that sense of comfort which only she could give me.
She brought back memories of my father and young Damask who had so wanted to come with her, and had made a doll for the baby. My father had insisted that messengers be sent as soon as my baby was born with word that I had a fine healthy boy. Edwina, who now had her own little boy and wanted everyone to know of her contentment, sent affectionate messages. It was like seeing them all.
I was very happy during those last days and even the apprehension which must come to a woman who is about to have her first child was stilled by my mother’s presence.
It was not a difficult labour and to my intense delight I gave birth to a healthy boy.
I had never seen Colum so overjoyed. He snatched the baby from my mother and marched round the bedchamber with him. Then he came and stared down at me. I thought I had never been so proud and happy in my life.
I had reached the summit of happiness. I had my beautiful son whom we named Co
If he had been out, as soon as he returned to the castle he would go to the child’s nursery and satisfy himself that all was well. He would pick up the boy and lift him high in the air. Je
I was delighted. I loved to see the joy Colum found in his son.
And I had given him to him. I sometimes marvelled that this boy of ours should have been conceived in such a ma
My mother stayed with me for a month after the child’s birth and then she thought she should return to Lyon Court. She had young Damask to look after. Next time she came, she said, she might bring her, although she thought she was a little young to make the journey. My father had set out on the first of his trading voyages and would be home, she believed, by Christmas. We must all spend Christmas together. It was unthinkable that we, living so near, should not. I must persuade Colum to come to Lyon Court but perhaps because of the baby they should come to us.
We said goodbye. It was September and a touch of autumn already in the air. The mornings were misty and the sea calm but grey. I thought that at Lyon Court they would soon be gathering the apples and pears and I remembered how we had done it the previous year and stored the fruit in the apple room.
I watched her ride away for as long as I could see her. She did not look round. I fancied there were tears in her eyes. But she had confessed herself well pleased with the way in which everything had turned out. I think she was comparing me with herself and perhaps on consideration she could say her marriage had been a happy one.
I wished that we were just a little nearer. If Castle Paling had been as near Lyon Court as Trewynd Grange was how happy I would be! The fifteen miles or so which separated us just made frequent visits not so easy to achieve.
The christening of Co
I was living in a dream of happiness and it seemed as if Colum was too. The beauty of the ceremony in the castle’s Norman chapel touched me deeply. My son wore the christening robes which had been worn by several generations of Casvellyns and I wondered whether the husband of Ysella and No
Colum had chosen the godparents—friends of long standing, he said. Sir Roderick Raymont was one—a man I did not take to—and another was Lady Alice Warham, a handsome woman who came to the castle with a meek husband several years older than herself.
Lady Alice carried my son to the font; and the ceremony was performed beneath that vaulted roof with its Norman archway and its massive supporting pillars of stone.
Co
When the ceremony was over and the cake had been cut and the baby had been admired by all, I took him to his nursery and gloated over him and I felt I was the most blessed of women, to have married in such an unusual ma