Saraband for Two Sisters

She took me up to the Castle Room, which had been used by his first wife. A brief marriage that had only lasted a year before she died in childbirth. What did she know of the wife? I asked. Had she learned anything about her? Very little, she answered. People didn’t talk about her. She had died more than ten years ago.

“And Richard? Don’t you ask him?”

“I don’t think he would like that.”

“You are a very good wife I’m sure, Angelet. Do you always do as he wishes?”

“Of course. Why does that amuse you?”

“I was just thinking that were I in your place I would at times be a little rebellious.»

“You would not. You have not been married and know nothing of the relationship between a man and his wife. Naturally I wish to please him in all things... .” Her voice faltered. “Oh, yes, little sister,” I thought. “You want to serve him in all things even though it is so distressing for you to submit to his embraces.” The situation amused and intrigued me; and there was the perpetual excitement of his presence. I found that all through the day I was waiting for the evening-those seemingly quiet evenings when Angelet sat at her embroidery and he and I talked or played out our battles on the chessboard or paper battleground. I read some of the books I found in his library. He discovered me there one day, coming upon me rather silently and looking over my shoulder. “What are you reading, Bersaba?” he asked.

I showed him.

“And it interests you?”

“Enormously.”

“You should have been a soldier.”

“They do not recruit women, I believe.”

“There is certainly one woman I know who would be as efficient as any man.”

“I might not excel on the battleground, but I should like to plan the battles.”

“You would be a general without delay.”

The faint lift of the lips was gratifying, for he was a man who did not smile very much. I wondered why. Was it because life had been difficult for him? I longed to know. I was not sure whether I was in love with him. I knew that I wanted to be with him, that I wanted him to make love to me so fervently that this obscured all other feelings. It had not been like this with Bastian. There had been no mystery about my cousin. I knew everything of importance that had happened throughout his life.

But here was my sister’s husband with that immense physical attraction which had overwhelmed me from the moment I had seen him and was growing every day. It was enhanced by that cool exterior, but being the woman I was I knew that was but a covering-a protective one perhaps-a disguise such as he would employ in battle tactics. Every day I learned something of him because I made him the subject of my main interest. He was conventional in the extreme; he had been brought up to believe in certain ideals. He would never swerve from them although he was extremely logical in all other matters. Loyalty to the King and the family would remain. I admired him for this (and yet I felt a perverse desire to break through them). Something had happened to him-something tragic, I knew that. Often I fancied that the secret was in this house. These servants of his - the Cherrys and the Jessons - did they know anything? They had been in his service for a long time. His young wife had died in childbed. Had he loved her tenderly, passionately? What a tragedy to lose both his wife and the child he had longed for ... for he was the sort of man who would want sons. It would certainly be a tradition of the family to carry on the line. There was a younger brother in the north, at Flamstead Castle, I gathered. I suppose he visited him there when he went on his travels. Why had he waited ten years after his first wife’s death before he had married? And why Angelet? Was she pretty? It was hard to say when you are judging a face so like your own. She had an innocence which I lacked. She would always have it. It went with her virginal nature. She was loving, emotional, romantic-and passionless. Once again I pictured nature neatly dividing our characteristics. “That one for you, Angelet, that for Bersaba.” Gentleness, mildness, simplicity for Angelet. And for Bersaba an overwhelming sensuality which when at its pitch blindly demanded satisfaction without thought of consequences. That comes first and that force will govern her life. For the rest she is selfish; she is proud; she is arrogant. But she has a lively mind and an ability to learn and perhaps-but she is not yet sure of this -an ability to get what she wants.

But she is not all bad, I defended. I touched the scars of my brow and I thought of how the determination to save Phoebe had seemed more important to me than anything, although I had not known of course when I set out on that journey in the rain to bring the midwife what effect it was going to have on my life. Would I have gone then? Certainly not. I was not all that noble.