Philippa Carr - The Miracle at St. Bruno’s

He was guilty of lust and deceit; he would burn forever in hell but great pleasure had been his in the woman who tempted him and the son who was the result of their lustful union.

I folded it carefully and locked it in a sandalwood box which my father had given me years ago.

Soon I would tell Bruno that I had proof of what had happened at his birth not only from his great-grandmother, who had told me when she was dying, but by this confession of his father’s.

But I must delay this until after Kate’s return to Remus.

WHEN KATE ARRIVED NEXT day I thought she seemed more subdued than usual. Catherine was quiet too. I fancied that she was resentful toward Kate, which was strange; generally they were in harmony for they shared a gay and carefree outlook on life.

When I took Kate to her bedchamber she said she must talk to me soon. Where could we go for quiet?

I suggested the winter parlor.

“I will be with you in fifteen minutes,” she told me.

I went straight to Catherine’s room. She was standing at her window staring moodily out.

“Cat dear, what is wrong?” I asked.

She turned around and flung herself into my arms. I comforted her. “Whatever it is I daresay we can do something about it.”

“It is Aunt Kate. She says we may not marry. She says that we must separate and forget and she has come to talk to you about it. How dare she! We shall not accept it. We shall….”

“Catherine, what are you speaking of? Marry whom? You are only a child.”

“I am nearly seventeen, Mother. Old enough to know that I want more than anything on earth to marry Carey.”

“Carey! But you and he….”

“Oh, yes, yes, we used to quarrel. But don’t you see? That was all part of it. Quarreling with Carey was always more exciting than being friendly with anyone else. We both laugh about it now and we can never, never be happy away from each other. Oh, Mother, you must persuade Aunt Kate. She is being so silly…. Why should she disapprove of me? Are we not as noble as she is? She is some sort of cousin of yours, is she not? And your parents looked after her or she might have been poor indeed and not had a chance to marry Lord Remus and have Carey….”

“Please, Catherine, not so fast. You and Carey have told Aunt Kate of your decision and she refuses to sanction the marriage. Go on from there.”

“She went quite odd when I told her. She said she would refuse to allow it, and she was coming to see you…without delay. And then right away she wrote to you and told you we were coming…and here we are.”

“You are overwrought,” I said. “I will go to Kate now and discover what this is all about.”

“But you would not be so unkind? You would not say no?”

“I can see no reason why you and Carey should not be married except that you are so young, but time changes that of course and providing you do not wish to hurry into marriage….”

“What sense is there in waiting?”

“A great deal of sense. But let me go and see what is worrying Kate.”

“And tell her how foolish she is! I daresay she wants a duke’s daughter for Carey. But he won’t take her. He’ll refuse.”

I told her not to get excited and I went down to the winter parlor where Kate was already waiting—unexpectedly punctual.

“Kate, what is all this about?”

“Oh, Damask, this is terrible.”

“I’ve gathered from Catherine that she and Carey want to marry and you are against the match.”

“So must you be when you know the truth.”

“What truth?”

“You were always so blind in some ways. They cannot marry because Carey is Bruno’s son and therefore Catherine’s brother.”

“No!”

“But, yes. So is Colas. You didn’t imagine Remus could get sons, did you?”

“But he was your husband.”

Kate laughed, but not happily or pleasantly. “Oh, yes, he was my husband but not the father of my children. Is that so hard to understand? There were three of us, weren’t there, playing there on forbidden grass? And didn’t you know how it always was between us? Bruno is not the saint he often likes to pose as being. He loved me. He wanted me. And to you and me of course he was the child in the crib. We deceived ourselves, did we not…most excitingly? We were in the company of one of the gods who had descended from the heights of Olympus. He was as pagan as that. And yet he was divine; he was a saint. In any case he was different from anyone else we knew. And he was important to us both. But I was always the one, Damask. You knew that. He came to Caseman Court when the Abbey was disbanded. He loved me and wanted us to share our lives but how could I share my life with a penniless boy! And there was Remus with so much to offer. So I took Remus but not before Bruno and I had been lovers. But marry him, no! Marriage was for Remus. I think Bruno came near to hating me then. He can hate, you know…fiercely. He hates all those who lower his pride. Keziah, his mother; Ambrose, his father; myself for preferring a life of luxury with Remus to a life of poverty with him. So there was before my marriage a kind of love between us—not wholehearted love. For us both it was overruled by ambition—in me for luxurious living, for him by his pride—his eternal overwhelming pride. I thought he could not then give me what I wanted and by my rejection of him I wounded him where he was most vulnerable. But the fact is that Bruno is the father of my son and your daughter and there can be no marriage between brother and sister.”

“Oh, God!” I cried. “What have we done to those children?”

“The more important question, Damask,” said Kate soberly, “is what are we going to do?”

“You have told them that they cannot marry but given them no reason?”

She nodded. “They hate me for it. They think that I am seeking an heiress of noble birth for Carey.”

“It’s the obvious conclusion. We must tell them the truth. It is the only way.”

“So thought I, but first I had to tell you and we must speak with Bruno.”

He stood there in the winter parlor, the light full on his face with those wonderful features which even now looked as though a halo should be shining on them.

I said: “Bruno, Kate has come with a terrible problem. Catherine and Carey want to marry.”

I watched his face closely. He said: “Well?”

I could scarcely believe that he could be so unconcerned.

I cried out: “Kate has told me that Carey is your son. Have you forgotten that Catherine is your daughter?”

He looked almost reproachfully at Kate. “You told Damask that?”

“I thought it necessary as this has arisen.”

He said coolly: “It should not be known. The marriage must be prevented for some other reason.”

“For what reason?” I cried.

“Do parents have to give reasons to their children? We do not wish the marriage to take place. That will suffice.”

I hated him in that moment. I had never seen him quite so clearly. He was not so much moved by the predicament of his son and daughter as at the prospect of how this would affect him.

I said: “It will not suffice. You cannot break people’s hearts and not tell them the reason because it would be inconvenient to do so.

“You are hysterical, Damask.”

“I am deeply concerned for my daughter, whom I regret is yours also. Oh, Bruno, come down to earth. Who are you, do you think, to take up this role of saintliness?”

It was Kate who said: “You are getting excited, Damask.” It was as though we had changed roles. I had always been the calm reasonable one and it had been I who had in the past warned her to be cautious.

“Excited!” I cried. “This is my daughter’s life. She is going to know the truth. She is going to know her father for what he is.”

“You must not be jealous because Kate and I have been lovers.”

“Jealous!” I said. “Not jealous. I think I always knew that I was the second choice…the one who had to come to you for yourself alone because Kate had refused to do so. It is all clear to me now. You had nothing to offer Kate except as a lover so, in her worldly fashion, she rejected you as a husband. Blithely she bore your son. Then, piqued, you went to London. There you either approached or were approached by foreign spies in this country who were interested in reviving what the King had destroyed.”

“You are wrong.”

“Indeed I am not. You…the god or whatever you think you are…are merely one of many little facets in the Spanish scheme. You went to the Continent on an embassy for the King, you tell us. You went to the Continent to take instructions from your masters. You were given money to acquire the Abbey and return it to what it was in the days before the dissolution. You were chosen because you were found in the Christmas crib in the Lady Chapel. Oh, it is all becoming very clear to me.”

“You are shouting,” said Bruno.

“And you are afraid that I shall explode your myth. Is it not time that myth was exploded? Is it not time that you were known for what you are? An ambitious man…who is not without his moments of lust and ambition and would sacrifice his son and daughter if need be to keep his pride intact.”

Kate said: “What has come over you, Damask? This is not like you.”

“It has been coming over me for a long time. I have seen so much of late. I have seen this man for what he is.”

“But you love him. You always did. We are bound together. We three were as one.”

“Not anymore, Kate. I am no longer close to either of you. You have deceived me, both of you. You will never do it again.”

“You must not take this hard,” said Kate. “It all happened so naturally.”

“Is it so natural,” I asked, “that a man should be unfaithful to his wife, that he should have sons, and his own daughter should want to marry one of them?”

“That is the situation to which we must give some thought,” said Bruno looking coldly at me. “When Damask has finished pitying herself perhaps we could discuss it.”

“Pitying myself! My pity is for those young people.”

“It must not be known,” said Bruno. “Catherine can be married suitably or Kate can find a wife for Carey who will make him forget Catherine.”

“We are not all so fickle in our relationships as you are,” I reminded him.

“They are young. They will recover. In a few months this will have been just an adventure to them,” said Kate.

“How glibly you settle the lives of others! It is nothing to you to make a loveless marriage for the sake of expediency. Others do not feel the same. They must be told the truth.”

“I forbid it,” said Bruno.

“You forbid it. You may have no say in the matter. This is my daughter. They shall be told, for in their present mood they could run away together and marry no matter what we say.”

“And if they did?”

“A brother and sister! What if there are children?”

Nobody spoke and I was horrified because I knew that Bruno was ready to let them marry and take the consequences rather than to tell them the truth.

I looked at him standing there.

And I could bear no more. I turned and ran from the room.

Catherine caught me on the stairs.

“Oh, Mother, what is happening?”

“Come to your room, my darling. I must talk to you.”

I took her in my arms and held her against me.

“Oh, Catherine, my dearest child.”

“What is wrong, Mother? What is Aunt Kate trying to do? She hates me.”

“No, my dearest, she does not. But you cannot marry Carey.”

“Why? Why? I tell you I will. We have said we will not allow any of you to ruin our lives.”

“You cannot marry him because he is your brother.”

She stared at me and I led her to the window seat and sat there with my arm about her. It seemed such a sordid story told simply.

“You see there were three of us, myself, Kate and your father. He loved Kate but he was poor then and she married Lord Remus but she had your father’s child. So you see he is your brother. That is why we say you cannot marry.”

“It is not true. It can’t be. My father! He is….”

She looked at me as though begging me to deny it.

“Men do these things,” I said. “It is not an uncommon story.”

“But he is not as ordinary men.”

“You believed that, did you not?”

“I thought him divine in some way. The story of the crib….”