Sacrilege

I could only go on staring in amazement.

‘You are thinking that I don’t waste any time, eh? Barely finished pushing out one man’s child before I’ve married another?’

‘I thought no such thing,’ I said, uncomfortably, because the idea had fleetingly crossed my mind.

‘My aunt sold me like a piece of livestock.’ She gestured towards the window. ‘Like one of those poor bleating beggars in the pens.’

‘So you murdered him?’ In my efforts to keep my voice down, it came out as a strangled squeak.

Sophia rolled her eyes.

‘No, Bruno. I did not. But someone did.’

‘Then who?’

This time she could not disguise the impatience in her voice.

‘I don’t know, do I? That’s what I want to find out.’

I shook my head, as if to clear it. ‘Perhaps you had better tell me this story from the beginning.’

She nodded, then drained her tankard and pushed it towards me. The ale was not strong, but drinking it fast had brought a flush of colour to her hollow cheeks.

‘I’ll need another drink first.’

‘There is no use in dwelling on all that happened before you left Oxford,’ she began, when a fresh jug of ale had been brought and she had finished a second piece of bread. I muttered agreement, avoiding her eye. I wondered if she remembered the night I had kissed her, or if that memory was buried in all that had happened after. I remembered it still, as sharply as if it had been a moment ago.

‘My father sent me away to my aunt in Kent, as you know. My mother cried when I left and promised it was only for a season, until my disgrace, as she put it, was past, but I could see by my father’s face that she was fooling herself. The stain to his reputation and his standing in the town was more than his pride could bear. I truly believe he would rather I had died than brought him a bastard grandchild.’

‘He as good as said so to me,’ I recalled.

‘Well, then. I was under no illusion when I set out to Kent in the company of one of my father’s servants. I had been cast off by my family for good and I had no idea what my future was to hold. It was several days hard riding and I was near four months with the child by then. I was ill the whole way and I feared …’ She looked down at the table, suddenly bashful. ‘I knew so little of such matters, I feared the rough journey would dislodge it before its time. Stupid.’ She shook her head, embarrassed.

‘Not at all,’ I said. ‘It would be an unnatural woman who did not worry about the safety of her unborn child.’

‘It turns out they are tougher than you think, these creatures,’ she said, allowing herself a soft smile. ‘In any event, I was safely delivered to my aunt – my father’s elder sister, so you may imagine she took the insult to his honour very much to heart. She was widowed, with modestly comfortable means, and she made sure that I was adequately fed and housed for the duration of my confinement. But it came at a price. The state of my immortal soul was her real project.’ She grimaced, and paused to take another gulp of ale. ‘I was allowed no books except the Bible and a book of prayer. Naturally, I was not permitted to step outside the house – she had told her neighbours that I was sickly and likely to die and that she was nursing me through my last months. Whether they believed her, I have no idea, but I was shut in my room whenever she had visitors.’

‘You were not moved to any religious feeling, despite your aunt’s efforts?’

She snorted and tossed her head in a way that reminded of how she was before, when she still had long hair to toss.

‘I told you, Bruno – I am done with religion, of any stripe. If there is a God, I am sure He must look with despair on His representatives, endlessly bickering over trifles. For myself, I would rather live without it.’

‘That makes you a heretic,’ I said, suppressing a smile.

She shrugged.

‘If you say so. It does not seem to have done you any harm.’

‘Oh, Sophia. Sorry – Kit. How can you say that? Do not take me as your model. I can never return to my home because I am called a heretic, you know this.’

‘Neither can I,’ she said, pointedly. ‘We are in the same boat, you and I, Bruno. We both live in exile now.’

I was tempted to detail for her all the ways in which our situations could not be compared, but I wanted to hear the rest of her story.

‘So your aunt was determined to make you repent …?’

‘I never knew how much my father had told her of the circumstances that brought me to her house. She was certainly of the belief that I had been wilful and disobedient and had made my long-suffering family pay the price for my dishonour. And she made it very clear that I would have no choice about the life I lived from then on, if I expected to be given food and shelter.’ She stopped abruptly, looked away to the window and swallowed hard. I sensed we were nearing the heart of her story; she had kept up the careless bravado convincingly so far, but I noticed she had barely mentioned the child. Perhaps she found it too painful to talk about.

‘Her plan was this,’ she continued, when she had taken another drink. ‘That I should wait out my confinement in her house, hidden away, stuffing my head with Bible verses day and night. Then, when the child was born, if it was healthy and a boy, it would be adopted by a couple of some standing in a neighbouring town who could not have a child of their own. She had it all worked out, it seems, and I am certain that money changed hands, though I never saw a penny of it. But she was very insistent that a boy would be the best outcome for all concerned – as if I could influence what was in my belly.’

‘And if it was a girl?’

‘I suppose they would have found a place for her, somewhere. There’d have been less reward, though.’

‘But it was a boy?’

Finally she looked up and met my eye.

‘Yes. I had a son. And he was healthy – so I was told. I only held him for a few minutes. They didn’t even let me nurse him. She said it was best that my body did not get used to him, nor him to me. Someone came at night to take him away, under cover of darkness. Those people – the people that bought him – they had a wet nurse ready, I’m told. So I’m sure he was well looked after.’

Here her voice cracked a little; I wanted desperately to reach out for her hand, but she held herself proud and upright, and simply clenched her jaw together until the danger of showing emotion had passed.

‘I don’t remember much about those days, to tell you the truth, Bruno. I was in a lot of pain while my body recovered from the birth, but that was nothing compared to the blackness that descended on me after they took him away. I had always believed I was someone who could bear grief with fortitude – I had done so in the past – but this was different. I could not eat or sleep nor even cry. All I was good for was lying on my bed, staring at the ceiling and wishing it would all come to an end somehow. At first my aunt was terrified I had taken an infection and would die – she had the physician out to me every day, at her own expense, and she had to pay extra for his discretion. I foolishly imagined she was doing this out of genuine concern and a sense of family duty.’

‘It must have been terrible.’

She shrugged again.

‘I suppose it was. But I had reached a point where I no longer cared what happened to me. I could feel nothing – not hope, nor fear, nor anger. Only blankness. I thought my life was over. I might as well have taken my chances being drowned on a boat to France.’

She held my gaze steadily as she said this, and although she had spoken the words gently, they cut to my heart. The previous spring, Sophia had been all set to flee Oxford for the Continent; it was my actions that had prevented her. I had intervened because I believed – with good reason, I still felt – that by stopping her flight I was saving her life, and that of her child. Over the months since then I had thought of her often and wondered how her life had unfolded as a result of my interference; I remained sure that I had done the right thing, but there was always room for a sliver of doubt. I feared, however, that even now she clung to her romantic hopes, and blamed me for stealing from her the future she had planned.

‘But then your child would not have lived,’ I said softly.

She lowered her eyes and picked another splinter from the tabletop.

‘True enough. And he is alive and well, somewhere, I trust. I hope they are kind people,’ she added, with sudden force. ‘I wish I could have seen them, to know what they are like.’ Her voice shook again, and she wiped her eye brusquely with her sleeve.

‘They must have wanted a child very badly, whoever they were. I’m sure they will treat him like a little prince.’

She looked up, her lashes bright with tears, and forced a smile.

‘Yes. I’m sure you are right. So I lay there in the dark, day after day, until eventually the bleeding stopped and the milk dried up, and my body was my own again. I’m sorry if this detail offends you, Bruno, but it is a messy and unpleasant business, being a woman.’

I spread my hands out, palms upward.

‘It is difficult to offend me. But I am sorry to hear you suffered.’