By the time she and Nosewyse returned to the ladies’ chamber, replete and scattered with crumbs, it was full daylight. This time no one asked where she had been. One of Woodstock’s physicians was leaning over Katerine, and her chaplain stood nearby, looking perturbed, running his prayer beads through his fingers.
‘What is happening?’ Jeanette asked.
‘The Countess has a fever and a headache, my lady,’ a maid said, her face pallid with fear.
Watching Katerine toss and moan, Jeanette felt queasy, and the bread she had just eaten sat uneasily in her stomach.Bruise-like swellings were developing under Katerine’s chin, and Jeanette sensed the fear in the room, tangible as a heavy cloak. This terrible thing feeding on Katerine might turn on her next, but no matter the loathing she had for her mother-in-law, she could not abandon her.
Without Katerine, she was the senior lady in the household, and after a hesitation she turned and addressed the head chamber squire. ‘Rob, fetch a scribe and find a messenger to ride to Langley. The lord William must know of this immediately. And send another to the lady Elizabeth,’ she added, although she did not relish the thought of the old woman coming to Woodstock. ‘Langley first, since it is further.’
The squire departed, his gaze wide with shock, and Jeanette turned back to the sickbed.
As the spring day strengthened into full sunshine Katerine’s condition deteriorated. Her fever brought on convulsions, and in between them she muttered in semi-delirium through cracked, dry lips. Jeanette had dreamed of gloating, but looking at this woman who was rapidly approaching death’s door, she was indifferent beyond a touch of pity.
Katerine’s eyelids fluttered open and she focused on Jeanette, suddenly lucid. ‘Well,’ she croaked, ‘all you need do now to win is to survive me.’
‘What kind of victory is that?’ Jeanette took the cloth, infused with rose water, wrung it out, and laid it on Katerine’s brow. ‘I will never get back the years that you and others have stolen from me. I shall be glad you are gone, but I shall not dance on your grave. Let God be your judge.’
Katerine stared at her with glazed eyes and licked her lips.
‘I shall not forget you,’ Jeanette said. ‘You have shown me what I hope never to become in the time that remains to me, and I am grateful. I do not expect you to ask me for forgiveness, nordo I ask any in my turn from you. But I advise you to ask it of your son before it is too late.’
By the following evening, the swollen lumps in Katerine’s throat had been joined by others in her armpits and groin. The tips of her fingers and toes had blackened and she had begun to spit blood. The priest had heard her confession and the household had gathered around the bed to wait and to pray.
William arrived at dawn, having ridden by torchlight from Langley as soon as he received the news. He was flushed, sweating, grimy, and stank of horse as he burst into his mother’s chamber. Seeing the grief in his expression and the disbelief, Jeanette experienced an uncomfortable wave of compassion.
‘Mama.’ He shouldered his way to the bedside and, kneeling, took her blotched hand in his. ‘Mama, I am here.’
She turned her head towards him, but when she tried to speak, blood trickled from her mouth.
‘Do not go, Mama, do not go. We need you here.’
Jeanette swallowed, feeling desperately sorry for him.
‘My boy,’ Katerine croaked. ‘I wanted so much for you . . . everything has been for you. Promise me . . . promise me you will abide by . . .’ She fought for breath, and fresh blood gushed over the pillows.
‘I promise,’ William said. ‘Mama, whatever it is, I swear on my soul.’
Katerine shuddered and convulsed again, and ceased to breathe. The priest placed a cross between her hands while someone hastily opened the shutters on the pearly morning light to let her soul fly free.
William stumbled to his feet, tears streaming down his face, and Jeanette’s own throat tightened to see his grief. She gently touched his arm. ‘William, I am so sorry.’
He cuffed his eyes and pushed her off. ‘No, you are not,’ he answered bitterly, and roughly pushed past her and out of the door. But once outside, he stopped and put his face in his hands, his shoulders shaking.
Jeanette ordered two attendants to bring a bowl of warm water and some food to the empty chamber next door. Also, to set up a bed there with fresh sheets. Then she went to him. ‘Come,’ she said. ‘You rode hard to get here in time. Let me find you some clean raiment and food.’
‘Why should it matter to you?’ he spat. ‘You have never cared before.’
‘I have grown up,’ she said. ‘I shall continue to fight against this sham of a marriage tooth and nail, but it is my Christian duty to offer you clean clothes and food, and to say I am sorry.’
‘I do not want your pity,’ he said fiercely. ‘I do not want you to look at me as though I am a wounded animal you want to put out of its misery.’
She turned away to compose herself and think of a reply, for that was exactly how she thought of him.
The maids arrived with a brass bowl of steaming water, soap of Castile, and a towel. Jeanette went to rummage in a clothing coffer to find robes that would fit him, and found a soft velvet tunic that had been his father’s. Katerine’s death had cut him adrift. He would pick up the threads again because he had to, but he was also going to lose the case, and that meant his mother, his wife, his future would all be gone. His grandmother had been a looming presence with Katerine alive, but at one stroke she had become a powerless old lady – as if all her teeth had been pulled out at once.
‘You need to rest,’ she said. ‘When you have slept, we shall do what must be done.’
‘I cannot sleep,’ he said. ‘What about the vigil?’
