Checkmate - Dorothy Dunnett [185]
She knew, for Kate had written her too, saying nothing, this time, of the long wait for her daughter’s homecoming; for she would know that Sybilla, in France, would be her ambassadress. Philippa said, ‘You would hear: they are all in Dieppe. Their dispatches came in today. Including one from Mr Crawford himself, asking leave to marry Catherine d’Albon.’
She did not have the energy, at that moment, to soften it; and the sense of it reached him as he bent, serving her himself, to place a glass of sweet wine at her elbow.
His hand, arrested, knocked the glass and tipped it fully over. The wine streamed, stickily golden, over the table and with an exclamation he knelt, his handkerchief out, and tried to collect it. Philippa drew back unharmed and glanced round, concerned, for something with which to help him.
When she looked back he was kneeling still, with one hand closed, gripping the table. The other spanned his averted face lightly, thumb and fingertip closing his eyelids. With a pang of pure distress verging on horror, she saw there were tears shining under his lashes.
One could not degrade him by touching him. Her heart hammering, Philippa dragged a square of dry linen from her sleeve and paused with that half-offered also.
But she had forgotten he was not a coward. The breakdown lasted only a moment. Then he turned, his eyes inescapably bright, and said, facing her, ‘I seem to be drenching you in two ways at once. I am sorry. I was taken aback.’ He looked down and releasing the wine-sodden kerchief said, ‘I shall send someone in to take care of this. Will you excuse me, Philippa?’
Another man had wept, long ago, all through a cold Turkish night; but not for her sake.
Her eyes stretched open, Philippa Somerville sat and watched the wine drip from the table-edge.
There were, sensibly, two courses open to her. She could leave before he came back, which with another man would be kind, but in his case would only prove her mistrust of his savoir-faire.
Or she could stay and watch him sacrifice his pride in order to restore the situation. In helping him, she would almost certainly provoke an offer of marriage. It was what, if you looked at it squarely, she probably wished to produce when, just now, she made that flat announcement. But she had not, of course, taken the trouble to examine her motives. She had acted … very probably acted … out of jealousy.
Which was not fair to Austin. She was going to have to leave France as soon as her bill of divorcement was final. Austin, if she guessed aright, would be freed in time to go home with her. Then, perhaps, she could make up her mind whether, by marrying Austin, she would be able to give him sufficient return for all the singular, selfless love he could offer her.
By the time he returned, she had made up her mind; and when the table had been dried and the servant withdrawn, she laid down the fresh glass he had poured for her and said, ‘What happened just now was my fault. Saving each other’s feelings is all very well, but it might be better to be frank. About what happened in the Séjour du Roi, for example. You may have guessed by now that Marthe Blyth is Lymond’s base-born sister. It is not spoken of, as Lord Culter is not aware of it. But that explains her outburst, a little.’
‘I see,’ said Austin Grey. His skin was still very pale against his dark hair but his eyes met hers directly. ‘She is jealous, perhaps, of her brother? Or of you?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ Philippa said. ‘What does matter is that she accused me before you all of being enamoured of Francis Crawford.’
She paused. ‘You may not have believed her. I don’t think the others did. But you ought to be told that she was right.’
Distress; disbelief; alarm; anger … all these she had been braced to receive and to deal with. But—‘Oh, my dear,’ he said only, and Philippa’s own eyes pricked at the understanding, the compassion