The Velvet Promise (Montgomery/Taggert 2)

Stephen and John looked as if they were leading two blind and helpless people across the graveyard. They led Helen and Gavin into a mausoleum and left them there while they went to get the horses.

Gavin sank heavily onto an iron bench. The child had been a son. His first son, he thought. Every word he’d said to Judith about the child not being his rang in his ears. And the baby was dead because of him. He dropped his head into his hands.

“Gavin,” Helen said as she sat beside him and put her arm about his shoulders. They’d had so little to do with each other since Helen screamed she wished she’d killed her daughter before allowing her to marry him. But over the months many things had changed. Helen had found out what it was like to love someone, and now she recognized love in Gavin’s eyes. She saw the pain he suffered over his lost child, the fear he had of losing Judith.

Gavin turned to his mother-in-law. He never thought of any hostility between them. He saw and remembered only that Helen was close to the woman he loved. He put his arms about her, but he did not hold her. No, it was Helen who held her son-in-law, and Helen who felt the hotness of

his tears through her rain-soaked gown. And finally Helen found release for her own tears.

Joan sat by her sleeping mistress. Judith’s color was gone, her hair damp with perspiration. “She will soon be well,” Joan said to Gavin’s unasked question.

“I’m not so sure.” He touched his wife’s hot cheek.

“It was a nasty fall she took,” Joan said, staring intently at Gavin.

Gavin only nodded, more concerned with Judith than with any talk.

“What do you plan to do to her?” Joan continued.

“Do to her?” Gavin demanded. “I hope only to see her well once again.”

Joan waved her hand. “No, I mean to Lady Alice. What punishment do you plan for the trick she played? Trick!” Joan snorted. “A trick that may cost my lady her life!”

“Don’t say that,” Gavin growled.

“I ask you again: what punishment do you plan?”

“Hold your tongue, woman! I know nothing of a trick.”

“No? Then I will speak my piece. There is a woman below, in the kitchen, who cries her eyes from her head. She has a gold coin which she says Lady Alice gave her to lead my lady to you while you were in bed with that whore. The girl says she thought she would have done anything for the coin, but she didn’t mean murder. She says Lady Judith’s baby’s death and maybe the lady’s own death are her fault and that she will go to hell for their murders.”

Gavin realized it was time to face the truth. “I would like to see this woman and speak with her,” he said quietly.

Joan rose. “I will fetch the girl if I can find her.”

Gavin sat with Judith, watching, noting that her natural color was returning.

It was some time later when Joan came back, pulling a frightened and cowering girl behind her. “This is the slut!” Joan said and gave the servant a vicious push. “Look at my mistress as she lies there. You have killed a baby, and now you may kill my lady. And she never hurt a soul. Do you know she often lectured me for mistreating scum like you?”

“Quiet!” Gavin commanded. The girl was obviously very frightened. “Tell me what you know of my wife’s accident.”

“Accident, ha!” Joan snorted, then quieted at Gavin’s look.

The girl, her eyes darting from one corner of the room to the other, told her story in disjointed, hesitant sentences. At the end, she threw herself at Gavin’s feet. “Please, my lord, save me. Lady Alice will murder me!”

Gavin’s face showed no pity. “You ask me for help? What help did you give my wife? Or our child? Shall I take you to where they have buried the child?”

“No,” the girl cried desperately, her head touching the floor.

“Get up!” Joan commanded. “You dirty our floor!”

“Take her away,” Gavin said. “I cannot bear the sight of her.”

Joan grabbed the girl’s hair and viciously pulled her up, then gave her a hard kick toward the door.

“Joan,’ Gavin said. “Take her to John Bassett and tell him to see that she is safe.”

“Safe!” Joan exploded then her eyes hardened. “Yes, my lord,” she said in a falsely submissive voice. She closed the door, twisting the girl’s arm behind her back. “She kills my lady’s baby, and I am to see her safe!” she muttered. “No, I will see that she gets what she deserves.”