Authors: Bertrice Small
Besieged (6 page)
He looked a trifle startled, but the Protestant minister said nothing. He was certain that the young couple would like each other. Besides, in the end all the parents would have their way, and the marriage would be celebrated. “Your daughter is a Protestant?” he inquired.
“She was born here at Maguire’s Ford, the posthumous child of my second husband, and she was baptized by my cousin. However, she has been raised in England’s church,” Jasmine explained.
“Perhaps I should baptize her a Protestant,” he suggested. “Sir Shane and his wife are very strict, and may be upset by this knowledge, my lady. I mean no offense, you understand.”
“One baptism is quite enough for any good Christian, Samuel Steen,” Jasmine told him. “If the fact my daughter was baptized a Catholic distresses them then perhaps their son is not for Lady Fortune. My daughter is, after all, a great heiress. She can have her pick of husbands. It does not have to be William Devers. It is providential that Fortune considers him at all.” She smiled sweetly at the minister.
She was a strong-willed woman, the minister thought, but he was not in the least put off by it. He hoped her daughter was as strong, for Fortune Lindley’s future mother-in-law, Lady Jane Anne Devers, was as tenacious as the duchess of Glenkirk. She was an uncompromising Protestant who had already spoken to him about removing the Catholics from Maguire’s Ford when her son became its master. Young William, of course, was more flexible, and if the young couple made Erne Rock their permanent home, he would be under his wife’s influence rather than that of his mother, which Samuel Steen suspected would be a better thing. He saw no reason to dispossess the Catholics of the village for their religion. Everyone got on well. If there was no one to interfere, they would continue to get on well.
On the morning that the Deverses were due to arrive, Fortune bathed with the help of her new maidservant, Rois, who was Bride Duffy’s youngest granddaughter. She was a slender girl of eighteen with dark braids, large blue eyes, and porcelain skin lightly sprinkled with several freckles across the bridge of her nose. Rois was soft-spoken and diffident towards her mistress. Her grandmother had been training her for several months for this coveted position in what was to become Lady Fortune’s household.
“Have you ever had a suitor, Rois?” Fortune asked as she stepped from her tub to be enfolded within a soft, warm towel.
Rois blushed prettily. “Kevin Hennessey and I would like to walk out, my lady, but grandmother says we must keep our attention on our positions. In a year, or two, we may be allowed to court.”
“What does your Kevin do?” Fortune was fascinated. It would seem that her servant had no more freedom than she had.
“Kevin helps Master Maguire with the horses,” Rois said.
“Does he like what he does? Is he good at it?” Fortune probed further. God’s bones! Getting information from Rois was like pulling teeth.
“Aye, he loves the beasties, as he calls them,” Rois said, warming now to her subject. “And he is very good with them. They say that one day he may take Master Maguire’s place, but that, of course, is a very long way off, my lady.”
“Have you ever kissed him?”
Rois blushed again, this time a far deeper hue than previously. “Ohh, my lady,” she squeaked. “You shouldn’t ask me such a thing.”
“That means you have!” Fortune pounced. “Good! What is it like to be kissed? I never have, except by my relations. It is far different with a suitor, I expect, isn’t it?”
Rois nodded her head, working furiously to dry her mistress. She wasn’t quite certain what to say. “When Kevin kisses me,” she said, and then quickly amended, “if he did kiss me, my heart beats a tattoo like a drum, and my whole being feels filled with light. It’s hard to describe, but it is wonderful. If, indeed, it actually happened.”
Fortune giggled mischievously. “That doesn’t tell me a whole lot, Rois,” she said frankly. “I guess you have to experience a kiss to know what it’s like. I wonder how long before William Devers tries to kiss me. I wonder if I will like this kissing.”
“Women usually do,” Rois replied. Then she slipped a clean chemise over her mistress’s head.
“My mother certainly does,” Fortune remarked, straightening the lace edging about the chemise’s low-cut neckline, and on the balloon sleeves that came just below her elbow.
Rois rolled a pair of cream-colored silk stockings up Fortune’s slim legs, gartering them with gold rosettes. Then she helped the girl into several silk petticoats. Next came the outer skirt of heavy deep green silk, the skirt falling in simple folds with its fullness toward the back, and open in the front to display the skirt petticoat of cream and gold brocade.
“Sit down, my lady, and let me do your hair,” Rois said. She unpinned the fiery mass from atop Fortune’s head and brushed it out vigorously, parting it in the middle, and coiling it into a flat knot at the nape of her mistress’s neck. She tied the single lovelock by Fortune’s left ear with a pearl-studded gold ribbon. Stepping back she observed her work, and then smiled. “Come on now, and let’s get into your bodice, my lady,” she said. She helped Fortune into the square-necked green garment, pulling the cloth down firmly so that the lace from the chemise showed; fastening the sleeves, which came to just below the elbow as did its undergarments, at the armscye, drawing down the lace from the chemise sleeves so that they showed. It was a simple gown, but an obviously expensive one. “You do look nice,” Rois said with great understatement. “Shall I bring you your jewelry box, my lady?”
“Aye,” Fortune said. When the maidservant opened the case, Fortune chose a long single strand of creamy pearls and slipped them over her head. They lay glowing and perfect upon her gown. About her left wrist she affixed a bracelet fashioned of a double strand of pearls. About her other wrist she wore a bracelet of gold links, each of the rounds studded with an emerald. Contemplating her rings Fortune chose a large baroque pearl, a round emerald, and a simple gold ring with the Lindley family crest, two swans with their necks intertwined to form a perfect heart. “There,” she said with a small chuckle. “That should be impressive enough for a first meeting.”
“Yer so naughty, my lady,” Rois giggled, and taking the jewelry case stored it away.
There was a soft tapping upon the door, but before Rois could answer it, the door opened to admit the duchess of Glenkirk who was garbed in rich burgundy silk, a necklace of pigeon’s egg rubies about her neck with matching earbobs that fell from her lobes, several rich bracelets, and her hands heavy with elegant rings. Her hair was done as was her daughter’s save that Jasmine wore no lovelock.
“How lovely you look,” she complimented both daughter and maidservant with her words. “The green is quite suitable for your hair, eyes, and skin. You have Irish skin like the O’Malleys, poppet. It is very fair.”
“Merci,
Mama,” Fortune replied. “I see you are dressed for battle,” she chuckled. “Is it really fair to intimidate poor Lady Jane at our first meeting? The duchess of Glenkirk is really quite grand.”
Mama,” Fortune replied. “I see you are dressed for battle,” she chuckled. “Is it really fair to intimidate poor Lady Jane at our first meeting? The duchess of Glenkirk is really quite grand.”
“I have been informed by those who know that Lady Jane is a very intimidating woman, Fortune. I want her to understand that I am even more intimidating, and by inference, that you will not allow yourself to be bullied. It is important to establish these things upon first meeting, else we have a difficult time doing so afterwards. You must remember it is young William you are contemplating marriage with, and not his strong-willed mama. He is, I have been told, a pleasant young man, as is his father. It is your future mother-in-law that we must put in her place today so you do not have any difficulties later on,” Jasmine advised her daughter.
“Listen to her ladyship, my lady,” Rois said with sudden unaccustomed frankness. “There are rumors even here at Maguire’s Ford about Lady Jane Devers, although my grandmam would skin me for saying so.”
“What rumors?” Fortune asked.
“They say she hates Catholics, and will not tolerate any about her. Those up in Lisnaskea must hide their faith, or risk losing everything—their homes, their positions, whatever they may be. Her stepson, Master Kieran, is only allowed to remain in the house because his stepmother will not drive him out for fear of a scandal. Sir Shane did disinherit him when he turned twenty-one and refused to convert to Protestantism,” Rois said. “Most believe her influence was responsible for it.”
“How is it that Sir Shane’s eldest son is a Catholic?” Jasmine queried the maidservant.
“Sir Shane was born into the one true church,” Rois said with complete ingenuousness. “His first wife, may God assoil her good soul, was Lady Mary Maguire, a kinswoman of Master Rory’s. She had three children before her death. The eldest was Moire, then came Master Kieran, and finally Colleen, who killed her mother in birthing. The older children were six and four when their mother died. Two years later Sir Shane courted and won the hand of Mistress Jane Anne Elliot, the only daughter of a London merchant who had settled in what the English call Derry.
“She was an heiress of some small means, and Sir Shane was attracted by both her fortune and her person. The only condition to the marriage was that Sir Shane convert to Protestantism, and raise his children as such. The poor man wasn’t strong in his faith. He had three motherless children. While wealthy in land and cattle, he hadn’t the coin his wealthy father-in-law-to-be could supply to restore his tumbledown manse and buy more cattle. He succumbed to their request, was baptized once again, this time by a Protestant minister, and swiftly married.
“Sir Shane’s two daughters were easily cajoled into following their father’s lead. Moire was eight, and had been her papa’s darling. She wanted to please him, and not lose him to her stepmother, although to be fair to Lady Jane, she has been good to her predecessor’s children. Little Colleen was but two when her father wed, and knew no better. Lady Jane is the only mother she ever knew. But Master Kieran was six, and as stubborn as his da’s prize bull. He had adored his mother. Now he had but two things remaining to remind him of her. A wee miniature he always keeps on his person, and her faith. While his father and stepmother forced him to attend church with them each Sunday, he would sneak away afterwards to attend the mass being held in secret somewhere in Lisnaskea. It was years before his father and Lady Jane discovered it. By then he was a young man, and when they confronted him he did not deny it. From that time on he would not attend church with them in their Protestant church.
“Lady Jane gave her husband two children. The girl was born first when Master Kieran was seven. She is called Elizabeth. Then came Master William the following year. There were no more children after that. The rumor is that Sir Shane has a mistress outside of Lisnaskea, one Molly Fitzgerald, who has two daughters by him, but it isn’t discussed aloud because she’s a Catholic. Finally, when Master Kieran was twenty-one his father gave him an ultimatum. Give up his Catholicism, or give up his birthright to his younger brother, William. ’Tis said that the father and son had such a terrible fight over it ’twas heard all the way to Ballyshannon, but Kieran Devers refused to give up his faith for a piece of land. So, the father disinherited him, and made young Master William his heir.”
“Yet Kieran Devers still lives in his father’s house?” Jasmine was curious about such a thing.
“His stepmother would not allow the father to dispossess the son for fear of what would be said. She wanted it to appear all her stepson’s fault. She wanted to be the good and gentle lady. So Master Kieran lives in his own rooms in a separate wing of the house. While there are those who are saddened by the loss of his inheritance, none can say with certainty that Lady Jane is responsible. It is very important to the lady how she appears before others,” Rois explained.
“Poor Master Kieran has nowhere else to go. His mother’s family are all gone, and the rest of his father’s family are over in Donegal. They are hardly known to him, if they know him at all. While Kieran Devers is proud, he’s no fool. Me grandmam says she thinks he enjoys remaining just to annoy Lady Jane, who would appear charitable towards him but is really not. ’Tis said she attempted to stop her husband from settling a sum on his son so that his wicked conscience might be salved, but Sir Shane would not listen to her then for he, too, cares what people think. The eldest son is in his will, and is given an allowance each year into the bargain. That generous allowance, I am told, comes from the inheritance the lady was bequeathed from her late father. I have heard it delights Master Kieran to donate a goodly portion of that allowance to the church just to annoy his stepmother.” Rois giggled. “I have never seen him myself, but they say Kieran Devers is as handsome as sin, and as wicked as the devil himself to boot. Yet he is kind, and always ready to help those who need it. Mostly our kind who have been driven off our lands for our faith,” she said.
“I have never heard you speak so eloquently before,” Fortune teased her maidservant.
“There was nothing to say until yer mam asked me,” Rois replied.
Jasmine smiled. “You’re a practical puss like my daughter, Rois. Bride did well to choose you for Fortune.”
The door to the chamber opened again, and the duke popped his head into the room. “The Deverses’ coach is just coming through the village,” he told his wife. “Come along, or we shall be late, and appear rude. We want to make a good first impression now, don’t we?”
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