London - Edward Rutherfurd [73]
As the household adjusted to this information, a change of mood began to take place at the trading post. At first it was almost imperceptible, but as the days went by there was no mistaking it.
Elfgiva was still there. Technically, since Cerdic had not yet sent her away, she was still his wife. However, in some indefinable way, people started to behave as though she had already left. If she gave an order, for instance, it would be politely obeyed, but something in the other person’s eyes would tell her that the servant was already thinking about how to please the new mistress. “It’s as though I’ve become a guest in my own home,” she murmured to herself. And then, with bitter irony: “One who’s starting to stay too long.”
Yet if everybody else was wondering when she would leave, she herself had still to make up her mind about what to do. She had a brother in East Anglia. But I haven’t seen him for years, she reminded herself. There were some distant kinsfolk living in a village a few miles from her childhood home. Could she go there? “Surely Cerdic can’t just send me out into the forest?” she cried. For the moment, though she hardly realized it, a strange lassitude crept over her. I’ll decide before Yuletide, she told herself. And did nothing.
Cerdic, too, said nothing. She did not know what he wanted nor how he meant to provide for her. He merely left her, still his wife in name, in a kind of limbo.
Ricola found that she was often with her mistress now. Although Elfgiva was usually reticent and dignified, occasionally, in her loneliness, she stooped to sharing a confidence with the slave girl. Ricola was certain the rift between Cerdic and his wife was complete. “The master’s not sleeping with her any more,” she told Offa. “I’m sure of that.” She braided and brushed Elfgiva’s hair with a secret tenderness. And once, after Elfgiva confided that she hadn’t decided where to go yet, she cautiously asked: “If the master means you to leave, Lady Elfgiva, then why hasn’t he made arrangements about it?”
“It’s quite simple,” the older woman explained with a sad smile. “I know my husband. He’s a cautious merchant. He’ll divorce me as soon as he has the new girl in his hands. Not before. He’ll wait until then.”
“I’d just leave,” Ricola blurted out. To which the older woman said nothing.
But this uncertainty left one problem which Offa brought up with Ricola one night. “If she’s sent away,” he demanded, “what do you think will happen to us? You and me?” He looked perplexed. “She bought us. Does that mean we go with her?”
“I should hope so,” the girl cried indignantly, surprising herself by the strength of her feeling. “She saved my life,” she added, to explain her vehemence. And then, staring at Offa she asked: “Don’t you want to stay with her?”
At first Offa could only reply by looking puzzled. Where would Elfgiva take them? He thought of the dark Essex forest; he had no wish to go back there. He thought of what little he knew about the huge cold openness of East Anglia. And he thought of the rich, lush valley of the Thames, and of the empty city with its hoard of gold.
“I don’t know,” he said at last. “I don’t know at all.”
As the days passed, there were two events in Ricola’s life that she did not discuss with anyone. The first concerned the merchant.
It was just a week after the baptism of his sons that he first looked at Ricola. It was nothing much. She had been emerging from the main house, stooping under the heavy thatch of the little doorway just as he strode up from the jetty. She had passed close to him, and he had looked at her.
She was neither surprised nor shocked. She was sensual; she accepted sensuality. He hasn’t had a woman in a week, she thought, and passed on. Nor did it worry her too much when it happened the next day. Better keep clear of him, she decided, and better not tell Offa, she added to herself with a grin.