Alys had had that thought before, other evenings, sitting here, and mostly took a kind of comfort from it that she never troubled to look at too closely. Looking too closely at things tended to lead to muddled thinking, she had found, and she did not need her thinking muddled. What she needed was a way to deal with Reynold tonight, and find more money for her priory soon.
They had always understood each other, she and Reynold; had always seen things straight on and from the same angle, with none of this wrongheaded fumbling about that most people called thinking. Most people could not think at all, needed their thinking done for them-or undone for them after they had made a mess of it-but it had never been like that for her or Reynold. They thought their way through to what they wanted and then went after it.
So why wasn’t he seeing how impossible a thing he was expecting of her about this girl?
And he wasn’t charming her into changing her mind. He always thought he could manage that whenever they disagreed, but this wasn’t a thing she could be charmed into and that was something she would have to have into his head before they had finished tonight.
The difficulty lay in doing it without losing him. She could not afford to lose him. She had told him the second or third time he had come to visit her this summer how much in need of him St. Frideswide’s was.
“Other places have patrons to benefact them. Why shouldn’t St. Frideswide’s?” she had said. “It’s for the good of the givers’ souls, and the better they give, the better for their souls.”
Reynold had laughed. “And next you’ll tell me that my soul needs all the bettering I can buy it.”
“You know about that better than I do,” she had answered austerely and he had laughed at her again, but he was the only person in the world who could laugh at her without rousing her anger and she had simply pressed on. “But yes, for the good of your soul, among other things, it wouldn’t harm you to help us.”
He could afford it. He had been a younger son without much to inherit, but he had found an heiress to marry and through her had come into property enough that he could lord it over the dozen or so knights and squires he liked for company. Alys, being a third daughter in a large family, had not had his chances, but she had won the gamble she had made in choosing St. Frideswide’s instead of marriage-she was prioress. But that was not going to be the end of it. There was more she wanted and she needed help to see her ambitions through to the end. Reynold’s help.
“But there won’t be an end to your ambitions,” Reynold had pointed out. “A tower now. A tiled floor later. A fountain for the garden after that. I know how it goes.”
She had not thought of a fountain until then, but all she had said was, “And is that so much when set against your soul safe in heaven instead of sent to hell?”
He had made her talk a great deal more, teasing her along, but come around to admitting she was right, that he needed heaven’s favor as much as she needed his help.
Not that it had come to much so far. So far he and his men had cost her more than he had brought in, and now he had saddled her with the problem of this girl; but at least he had brought food in today, too, as he had promised. He had done it last week, too, and once before that. It was a beginning. All she had to do was be patient at him.
She heard his laughter from below and Father Henry saying something and Katerin’s quick footfalls on the stairs as she hurried ahead to open the parlor door. Alys straightened in her chair. She would have preferred to deal with Reynold alone, but for decency’s sake Father Henry and Katerin would have to be here. By rights so should at least one of her nuns, but Dame Frevisse was undoubtedly telling them enough of what had happened in the yard this afternoon to keep their tattling tongues busy without one of them here to gather more for them.
Katerin came in smiling and stood aside to hold the door open. She did not need to but it was a skill she was proud to have and Alys let her. Reynold followed her, concentrating on carrying a fat, green-glazed pitcher with a linen towel laid over it.
“Spiced wine, cousin mine,” he said cheerfully. “To take the chill off both the evening and your humor.” He set it down on the table, crossed to her, and took her hand to kiss.
Trying to be gracious in return-you caught more flies with honey than vinegar-Alys let him and found as he stepped back with a grin, freeing her hand, that he had left a small leather purse in it.
“To show I’m sorry I’ve upset things for you,” he said.
She could feel the coins through the leather. A lot of them and goodly sized. Not gold surely?
“Only some of them,” Reynold said, as sure of her mind as if she had asked it aloud. “But some is better than none!” He swung away to the table. With Father Henry safely in, Katerin had left the door and was hurrying to fetch three of the priory’s six silver goblets from the carved aumbry against the far wall. She reached the table with them as Reynold did and he rewarded her with a smile that she returned, round-eyed and gazing up at him in a way that told Alys that even an idiot could go more idiot for a man’s smile. Why did women do that? Pleasurable it might be to have a man smile on you, but it was hardly worth giving up your wits for, though women did-even when they had no wits to give, like Katerin.
Reynold poured the wine with the same deft-wristed skill he had shown as a squire serving at her father’s table, raising and lowering the pitcher so the wine fell in long curves, ruby-glinting in the firelight. The goblets filled, he set down the pitcher, and taking up two of them, turned to Alys, asking as he held one out to her, “Will you drink with me, cousin? Despite you’re angry with me?”
She knew what he was doing-trying to buy her off with gold and charm. It would not work, she knew him too well. But that did not mean she would turn down the coins or good wine either, and she held out her hand, saying grudgingly, to show she was not giving ground, “I’ll drink with you.”
“There’s my girl!” said Reynold. “Angry but not unforgiving.” He came to hand her a goblet, and she took it, saying at Father Henry, “Take yours and go sit at the window, Father. Katerin, you stand by the door.” They were here for propriety’s sake, but they did not need to be near enough to hear what passed between her and Reynold. Father Henry understood as much and went where he was told. Katerin had no thought about it at all and obeyed as simply. Reynold pulled up the other chair to hers and the fire but did not sit, instead raised his goblet to her and declared, “To us, whatever comes of it!”
That was none so bad a wish and Alys drank to it, only to find when she lowered the goblet that he was looking down at her with a semblance of solemnity but a dimple showing beside his mouth, betraying him the way it always had when they were young and he was trying to deny a mischief.
“So, I’m forgiven?” he asked.
“Not yet nor by a long way,” Alys snapped. “Sit down.” Her head still ached. She refused to think about it, but that did not mean she wanted to crane her head back looking at him.
He sat and they eyed each other, their wine-warmed goblets between their hands, until Reynold leaned back in his chair with a deep sigh she did not believe came from as near the heart as he made it sound, and said, “So, what can we agree on about this girl?”