She lost all sense of direction; the castle was a great confusing mass of stone, hall after hall, building after building stacked and added round the colossal massif of the donjon. She saw through arrow slits past a spurred drum tower, across a vastness of heathland clear to the harbour of Poole; she climbed a stair set curling into a buttress to a chamber where Lord Robert of Wessex, son of Edward Lord Purbeck, swung irritably at a bellrope that threatened to disintegrate under his attentions.
Margaret was given, kicking, into the charge of a burly female in the brown and scarlet livery of the House. ‘Do something with it,’ swore Robert, flapping his arms. ‘Take it off and bathe it or something, before it starts to sneeze. It stinks of the sea…’
Margaret, furious, tried to swing round on him but the iron-studded door had already slammed. At her spluttered accusations of kidnapping the servingwoman laughed. ‘What, with his mother at home? He keeps his own nest clean, ye can be sure of that… Oof… Come on now m’lady, don’t be cross-grained… Ow, you little beast
The room to which Margaret was lugged, and in which she was deposited spitting, was by the standards of the place small. Delicate perpendicular arches supported windows of stained glass that repeated glowingly the heraldic motifs of leopards and lilies. Brocade drapes covered part of the walls; in the floor was a massive bath built of slabs of polished Purbeck marble. Over it loomed an ornate geyser, black japanned, replete with rings and polished curlicues of copper. Grilles in the walls covered what were evidently the vents of a warm-air system. Margaret was impressed in spite of herself; her home at Durnovaria was well equipped, but this was a standard of luxury she had never seen.
Two girls attended her. She frowned, half minded to send them packing; she was distinctly unused to being bathed. Sister Alicia used to scrub her sometimes when she was first away at school; ‘Come along,’ she’d say, ‘you unsavoury little thing,’ and bang her down in one of the great square tubs, already swilling with icy water, and let fly at her with a large hard-bristled brush, and sometimes she nearly enjoyed it; but that was years ago, a lot of things had changed.
Margaret shrugged, and started to wriggle out of the tabard. If this crazy young nobleman cared to waste the time of his house-people on her then the chance was too good to waste; it would probably never come again.
The bath was filled rapidly, with much snorting and hissing from the geyser; the maids bound her hair, and one of them added to the water a handful of something that produced great towering masses of iridescent foam. That intrigued her, she’d never seen anything like it. An hour later she was feeling nearly inclined to be civil again; she’d been scrubbed and kneaded and massaged, and had to kneel upright while they poured on her shoulders something that smelled of sandalwood and ran and burned like fire and left a splendid glow in the muscles of her back that soaked away stiffness and tiredness. There was a dress laid put for her, a formal thing with a wide scooped neckline and miles of frothy skirt, and a diamante circlet for her hair. The clothes fitted; she wriggled, feeling the satin-cleanness of her skin against the cloth, and wondered a little wildly just how well Robert had equipped the castle with the apparatus of seduction. She found out later he’d ordered his absent sister’s wardrobe ransacked for the occasion; whatever his faults, he certainly never did things by halves. She was badly worried now about Sarah and her parents, but events seemed to have passed her at the gallop; it was bad enough just trying to keep pace.
It was evening before she was through, the sinking sun throwing mile-long shadows across the heath, waking blazing reflections from the tier on tier of diamondlighted and mullioned windows; the castle seemed to butt against the huge western haze like the prow of a stone ship. Sounds from the fair floated across the baileys; shouts, the din of the organs, the grumbling vibration of the rides.
Dinner was served in the sixteenth-century hall built alongside the donjon; the diners promenaded outside it, richly dressed, arm in arm in the warm air. Margaret was vaguely disappointed when she learned the great keep had been disused for centuries except as storehouse and armoury. On high days and holidays the Lords of Purbeck were accustomed to take their meals in the ancient way reintroduced by Gisevius; the less favoured guests sat at long tables in the body of the hall while the family and their personal friends ate on a raised dais at one end. Lamps burned in profusion, lighting the place brilliantly; the minstrels’ gallery was occupied by a small orchestra; servingmen and girls scurried about tripping over the dogs, brackets and mastiffs, that littered the floor.
Margaret, still a little dazed, was introduced to the Lady Marianne, Robert’s mother, and to the half dozen or so important guests. Her mind, whirling, refused to take in the names. Sir Frederick something, His Eminence the archbishop of somewhere else… She curtsied automatically, allowed herself to be steered finally to a place at Robert’s right. A cold nose shoved into her lap warned her she was attended; she fondled the bracket absentmindedly, tickling beneath the ears, and drew from her host a grunt of surprise. ‘You’re honoured, y’know that? Doesn’t take kindly to anybody, not that one. Had a swipe at one of the Serjeants the other day.’ He grinned broadly. ‘Two fingers…’
Margaret gently withdrew her hand. Mutilation seemed for Robert a major source of fun.
He’d heard her name more than once, introduced her by it a dozen times, but it seemed it hadn’t sunk in. She asked him, with as much dignity as she could muster, for a message to be sent to her home. Her eyes hadn’t missed the semaphore rigged beside the keep, or the chain tower on the nearby hill. He listened looking faintly surprised, bending his head to catch the request, then snapped his fingers to the Signaller-Page hovering nearby. ‘Who’d ye say, Strange?’
‘My father,’ said Margaret coldly, ‘is Timothy Strange of Strange and Sons, Durnovaria.’
The bombshell was not without effect. Robert grunted, raised his eyebrows, swigged wine, drummed a tattoo on the linen cloth. ‘Well, damme,’ he said. ‘Damme. Well, I’ll marry a bloody Bulgarian…’
‘Robert…!’ That from the Lady Marianne, a little further along the board.
He bowed to his mother, unabashed. ‘I see,’ he said. ‘Well, you’re a bad-tempered young bitch, I suppose that goes a way to explaining it…’ He scribbled on the pad proffered by the Signaller. ‘Look lively with that, lad, or we shall lose the light.’ The boy departed, scampering; a few minutes later Margaret heard the clack and bang of the semaphore, the answering clatter from the great tower on the hill. An acknowledgement was back-routed before nightfall; just a frosty ‘Message received and understood.’ From that, she presumed she was in disgrace.
The night passed quickly enough, too quickly for Margaret; she could imagine well enough the surly reception waiting for her at home. The dinner was followed by an entertainment by a troupe of acrobats and fairground people. Trained dogs bounced through hoops, ran on their back legs in kilts and breeches; the affair was a great success. The near-demise of one of the performers, caught and tossed by Robert’s delicate tempered hounds, scarcely dampened proceedings.
The animal act was followed by a jongleur, a long-faced, mournful-looking man who, evidently primed by Robert, delivered a series of rhymes in a thick patois that Margaret perhaps fortunately couldn’t follow but that set Robert roaring with amusement. Then trays of nuts and fruit were passed, and more wine; the party broke up well past midnight, Robert bellowing for linkboys to escort Margaret to the room he’d had prepared.