He lies and he steals
And he slithers out to kill.
My sweet master will slay him,
Come what will.
“Why do you keep calling him ‘sweet master’?” Philippa asked, irritated and frightened and wondering all the while what her cousin had done to earn such enmity.
Crooky gave her a small salute with a dirty hand and said with a wink, “Think you not that he is a sweet master? The females hereabouts think him more than sweet. They like him to bed them, to push apart their thighs and—”
“Hush!”
“Forgive me, mistress. I forget you are yet a maid and unknowing of the ways of men and women.”
Edmund, hearing this outpouring from Crooky, frowned at Philippa and said, “Are you truly a maid? Still? I know you were before, but . . . You still aren’t my father’s mistress, even after all the times he’s carried you off to his chamber? You said that—”
“I’m not his mistress. I’m naught but his drudge, his captive . . .” Philippa ground to a halt. She was also St. Erth’s steward. “Why aren’t you wearing your new tunic? You don’t like it? I know that it fits. Margot told me it did. ‘Tis well made, and the color suits you. And the hose and shoes. Why don’t—”
“I don’t like them. Besides, my father doesn’t wear anything new. Until he makes me, then I’ll stay the way I am.”
“You are such a stubborn little irkle.”
“ ‘Tis better than being a maypole.”
“Edmund, if you do not wear your new tunic on the morrow, I will come to your chamber, hold you down, and put it on you. Do you understand me?”
“You won’t!”
She gave him a look to shrivel any male. He ducked his head, and she saw that he was quite dirty, his fingers and fingernails coated with grime. He looked like a villein’s child; he looked like he’d been wallowing in mud with Tupper. She had to speak to Dienwald about this. He forced his son to learn to read and write and cipher but allowed him to look like a ragged little beggar.
“Yes,” she said, “yes, I will. And you will bathe, Master Edmund. When was the last time your hands were in soap and water?”
“There ban’t be any soap, mistress,” Old Agnes shouted to Philippa. The old woman had amazing hearing when it suited her. “No one thought to make it,” she added, quick to defend herself should the need arise. “The master said aught.”
Philippa called back, “But that is absurd. I have used soap in the master’s chamber.”
“Aye, thass the last of it. The master likely didn’t realize it was the last of it.”
“We will make soap on the morrow,” Philippa said. “And you, you pigsty of a boy, will be the first to use it.”
“Nay, I won’t!”
“We’ll see.”
Philippa had much to consider that night when she closed the door to her small chamber. She’d just pulled the frayed tunic over her head and laid it carefully over the back of the single chair when she heard his voice say softly, “Put it back on. I don’t wish to enjoy you here. I want you in my bed, where you can warm me when it grows cold near dawn.”
“I’m not your mistress! Go away, Dienwald!”
“I’ve already enjoyed a woman this night. I have no pressing need for another, be she even as soft and big and, in truth, as eager as you. Come along, now.”
Her eyes had adjusted to the dimness of the chamber and she saw him now, holding her discarded gown, his hand stretched out to her. She was standing there quite naked, just staring at him. Philippa grabbed the gown and pulled it over her head. In the next moment he had her hand and was pulling her after him, out of the steward’s chamber.
There were still a dozen or so people milling about the great hall, and two score more sleeping on pallets lining the walls. “Hush,” he said, and pulled her after him. Everyone saw. No one said a thing. Not a single man yelled advice. Philippa wanted to kick him, kick all of them, hard.
She tugged and pulled and jerked, but it was no use. He turned on her then, frowning, and said, “No more carrying you. You come willingly or I will drag you by the hair.”
“You will pay for this, Dienwald, you surely will.” She gave him an evil smile. “I will send word to my dear cousin Sir Walter—aye, and I’ll tell him what a cruel savage you are, a barbarian, a—”