Philippa Carr - Saraband for Two Sisters

‘Alone in Holland!’ cried my mother. ‘You should have come home then.’

‘I had friends. One of these was a Spaniard. He took me with him to Madrid and I lived there for some years in fine style. When I lost him I set out to look for my mother because I knew that she was there. I found her. She was married to a gentleman of high nobility, a friend of King Philip … You remember him, Tamsyn. He was here as Lord Cartonel. You thought he came courting me.’

‘I remember him well,’ said my mother soberly.

‘My mother had never been what you would call maternal. She never wanted me. I was an embarrassment … no, not even an embarrassment … an encumbrance, shall we say, right from the first. I should never have been born. It was a miracle that I was and that was due to your mother, Tamsyn, who found mine on the shore half dead and to her own detriment brought us both into this castle.’

‘It was long ago,’ said my mother, ‘and you were brought up here as my sister, Senara. There are unbreakable ties between us and I am glad that you have come back to us.’

‘Do tell us what happened,’ begged Rozen.

‘I went to Court. I married a gentleman of rank. We had a child, Carlotta. I had always wanted to see you, but of late the urge became irresistible. I must see you and Castle Paling before I was too old to travel. My husband agreed that I should pay a visit. He could not accompany us. He has a post at Court. So we set out. We arrived in London … and we travelled here by stages. That is all and now we are here and right glad to see you.’

‘You will stay with us for a long while, I hope,’ said my mother.

‘I have a feeling that I shall not be eager to leave this place. I must go back to Spain in due course, but to me Castle Paling is what I think of when I say home.’

My mother was deeply moved; so was Aunt Melanie.

Uncle Connell said that we must all drink to the return of Senara with her daughter and she must regard Castle Paling as her home for as long as she wished to, to which my mother replied with some firmness: ‘Senara was my sister. There is a home for her at Trystan Priory if she so wishes it.’

Senara held out one hand to my mother and one to Aunt Melanie.

‘God’s blessings on you both,’ she cried, ‘and right glad I am to be here. I long to be once more in the Castle, but when I lived here Tamsyn was my sister. We shared a bedroom at one time, do you remember, Tamsyn?’

‘Until you went to the Red Room.’

Senara closed her eyes and laughed, and I knew that she and Mother exchanged some memory.

‘You were my sister and it was to be with you that I came here. Yet the castle was my home … all the time I lived here. I will go with you, Tamsyn, for a while and then I will come back and stay at Castle Paling. How’s that? Of course it may well be that you will not want me here …’

‘Not want you!’ cried Melanie. ‘Why, it was your home.’

‘We change in … how many years is it, Tamsyn? Nearly thirty. What time has done to us. You do not look the age I know you must be. You live again in these delightful twins.’

‘As you do in your Carlotta. Women stay young when they think young and feel young and look young,’ said my mother.

Senara touched her plentiful black hair in which there did not appear to be one grey strand. ‘I have always cared what I look like. As did my mother. She has many secrets.’

‘She lives still?’ asked my mother.

‘In Madrid in grand style. It is how she always wanted to live. She resented it here.’

‘And she has remained young and beautiful?’

‘Not young—even she could not manage that. But she still is beautiful. She rules her household like a queen and it is said that she is more royal than royalty.’

‘Yes, I can believe it. What did she think of your coming to England?’

‘She scarcely gave the matter a thought. Perhaps she considered me a little mad. But she knew that I had been brought up by your mother and your influence was strong with me. You had made me sentimental, affectionate … a little like yourselves … Therefore I had these odd notions.’

Uncle Connell said: ‘I have a very special black cherry brandy. I shall send to the wine cellars for it. We will all drink to celebrate your return.’

‘You are good to me, Connell,’ said Senara. ‘Never shall I forget how you helped me escape from this house.’

‘Do you think I would have allowed the mob to lay hands on you?’

‘You became master of the castle on that night. Everyone knew then that though the old master lay crippled in his chair there was a new one as strong to take his place.’

I was fascinated. As they talked I was trying to piece the story together. One day I should read it all in the diaries of my mother and her mother Linnet, who had been the one who had rescued the witch from the sea, that witch who was this Senara’s mother.

We sat at the table. No one wished to move. They went on talking and we of the younger generation listened avidly, and as they talked a storm began to rise. The sky grew dark and we could hear the wind rousing the sea.

Melanie called for more candles to be lighted and the servants tiptoed around lighting them while the storm outside seemed to be increasing.

Still we sat on. It was as though no one wanted to leave that table; and Aunt Melanie, my mother, Senara and Uncle Connell talked of the old days and the picture of their lives began to take shape.

Then suddenly the door was flung open. We heard the roar of a voice which there was no mistaking. It belonged to Grandfather Casvellyn.

He propelled himself into the hall, his eyes looking wilder than ever as they raked the table and came to rest on Senara.

Melanie had risen to her feet.

‘Father … how did you come here? How did you leave the Seaward Tower?’

He glared at her. ‘No matter,’ he shouted. ‘I did. They brought me down. They carried me and brought me here. I insisted. If I want to come into any part of my castle I’ll do so. She’s here, they tell me. She’s come again … as they did all those years ago … the witch’s girl.’

‘Father,’ said Connell, ‘it’s Senara. Your own wife’s daughter.’

‘I know who it is. I was told and I knew they dared not lie to me. What do you want here?’ he demanded, glaring at Senara.

She rose and went to him. She was smiling in a way I didn’t understand. She knelt before him and lifted her face. In the candlelight it looked young and very beautiful.

‘I came back to my old home,’ she said. ‘I came to see you all.’

‘Go back where you came from. You and your kind bring no good to this house.’

Melanie cried: ‘Father, how can you!’

‘Don’t call me “father”. You’ve no right … just because my son married you. She’ll bring no good here. She’s her mother all over again.’

‘I’m not,’ cried Senara. ‘I’m different.’

‘Send her away. I won’t have her here. She’s … disaster. I’ll not have her here reminding me of her mother.’

Tamsyn said: ‘Father, you are cruel. Senara has travelled far to see us, and if you’ll not have her here she knows she will always find a home with us.’

‘Fool!’ cried my grandfather. ‘You were always a fool.’

‘Was I?’ said my mother with spirit. ‘If I am a fool then I do not know the meaning of wisdom. For I have found happiness in my home and my husband and my children which wise men like yourself—or so you think—ever failed to do.’

He glared at her, but I could see the admiration for her in his face. He was proud of her and I think it was not the first time he had been.

‘Then,’ he said, ‘you should have more sense than place them in jeopardy.’ He pointed to Senara. ‘That one … comes of evil stock. Her mother came here and bewitched us all. She’ll do the same. She should never have been born. I warn you, daughter. Be wise. Listen to me. I know. I lived it all.’ His voice broke suddenly. ‘By God,’ he cried, ‘don’t you think I live it all again up in that tower when I look out at the waves and the Devil’s Teeth out there. And I say to myself everything would have been different if the sea had not thrown up Maria the witch on my coast. Your mother was a fool like you. She brought in the witch who spoiled her life. It’s like a pattern, you fool, girl. Don’t you see it? The Devil has sent her to take your happiness from you.’

‘Father,’ said my mother, ‘you have suffered so much, you are sick …’

‘Yes, an old fool of a man, that’s what you say. By God, I’d lay a whip about your shoulders, old as you are, if I was not, confined to this chair. I’ve lost the power of my legs but I’ve a mind that I command still. I’ll tell you this, if you take that woman into your house you’ll rue the day, and you’ll remember this moment and what I’ve said to you.’ He began to laugh and it was unpleasant laughter. ‘All right. I’ll not forbid it. I’ll watch. I’ll see my words come true. I’ll look out on you from my tower and I’ll prove my words come true. Bring the witch’s daughter here … into my castle. Let me show you that I’m right.’

Then he turned and wheeled his chair away. He was calling, ‘Binder. Binder,’ and the terrified manservant came to take the chair and push it out of the hall.

There was silence.

It was Carlotta who spoke first. ‘What a terrible old man,’ she said.

‘He married your grandmother,’ said Senara. ‘It was your grandmother of whom he spoke with such venom.’

‘He must have hated her.’

‘He was bewitched by her.’

‘He’s mad, isn’t he?’

‘Who would not be mad?’ asked Senara. ‘Such a man as he was to be kept a prisoner in a chair!’

My mother said: ‘You will come with us, Senara, to Trystan Priory when we leave. You would not want to stay here now.’

Senara laughed. ‘I’ll not allow him to decide my plans,’ she said. ‘Connell is the master now. If he wanted me to stay … and Melanie wanted it … I would not care for that madman’s words. I shall come to Trystan to be with you—depend upon it, Tamsyn—but I want to be in the castle for a while first.’

Melanie rose. She was clearly shaken by the scene my grandfather had made.

‘It seems as though the storm will not abate for a while,’ she said. ‘But there is no reason why we should sit over the table waiting for it. I will take you to the room which will now be ready. You may want to rest.’

‘I could talk and talk,’ said Senara. ‘Tamsyn, come with me to my room. Let us pretend it is years ago and we are young again.’

My mother went to Senara and they embraced warmly. Everyone began to talk as though nothing had happened. After all, we were accustomed to Grandfather’s outbursts, but I could not forget the wildness of his eyes, and the words he had spoken kept ringing in my ears.

THE CHANGE WAS APPARENT in the first day. This visit was like no other. Before we had rarely made plans for the days. We would come down to breakfast, which was a tankard of ale and bread with cold bacon, and we helped ourselves to this. Then we would go our separate ways. There had been a free and easy atmosphere about the castle. Sometimes I would ride with my sister and any of the girls who liked to accompany us; or I would go to the sea-shore and add to my collection of shells and semi-precious stones, or I would simply explore the castle. There was so much to do. When we had been young we had been allowed to play all sorts of games in the various towers as long as we did not penetrate Grandfather Casvellyn’s Seaward; and the castle had seemed to us an enchanted place.

It was still that in a way, but it was different.

Senara, my mother and Aunt Melanie seemed to want to talk all the time about the old days; Senara must go round the castle exclaiming: ‘I remember this well,’ or ‘Oh, look at that. Fancy its still being here.’ That left Carlotta to us.

We were wary of each other—particularly was Bersaba wary. Carlotta talked in that half foreign way which was attractive; her clothes were different; they, with her voice, her manners and her incomparable beauty, set her apart. It would have been different if she had not been aware of this, but she was.

Bersaba and I with Rozen and Gwenifer took her on a tour of the castle.

‘Is it very different from what your mother told you?’ asked Rozen.

‘Very different.’

‘And we are different too?’ I asked.

She laughed, shaking her head. ‘I did not know of you, therefore I could not picture you. You are different from the people I know.’