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on his crusade to the Holy Land.
    “Your father became incapable shortly after your birth,” Alette said bluntly. “I was glad, for though I was a virgin when he married me, I believe him to have been an unfeeling and rough lover. A woman, even one lacking in experience, instinctively knows such things.”
    To her great mortification, Isabelle blushed at her mother’s frankness. Her elegant, noble father had been her ideal. To learn that he was less than perfection was disquieting.
    “My marriage, however,” her mother continued, “is not the point of this discussion, my daughter. Your marriage is.”
    “I will not wed with that plain-faced, great gawk of a man,” Isabelle said stubbornly. “Could not the king have sent me a pretty fellow like his companion? Besides, if I am not willing, there can be no marriage, can there, madame?” She smiled smugly, and then gasped with surprise as her mother lashed out, slapping her cheek hard.
    “Are you really so dense that you cannot fully understand what I have just told you, Isabelle? You no longer have choices. Langston is not yours. If you do not marry Hugh Fauconier, who will you marry? Who will have a landless, dowerless girl? Especially one with such overweening pride, and a bad temper. And what is to happen to me, my daughter? Do you care at all? Must I walk the dusty roads of England in my old age begging charity? Even you cannot be that heartless, Belle! You cannot! ”
    Isabelle burst out laughing. “Madame, you are hardly ancient. In fact, you are most beautiful, and yet young. Can you not obtain another husband who will house us both? Why do you not wed Hugh Fauconier? That would certainly be an ideal solution.”
    “For you, perhaps, but not for me. I would not marry again if I could. Widowed, I am free to manage my own life. I am quite content to remain that way, which is just as well for there is no one here to have me. Be sensible, Isabelle. HughFauconier seems a good man who will treat you well if you would but allow him the opportunity and say a kind word to him.”
    “He is a Saxon, madame. You know how my father felt about Saxons. He did not like them at all,” Isabelle reminded her mother.
    “This man is the king’s friend, Isabelle. The priest says that he was raised with King Henry. If the king has accepted him, how can you reject him? Even your father would not deny his liege lord. You must wed him! ”
    “I will not!” Isabelle stamped her foot angrily.
    “You will remain in your room on bread and water until you change your mind,” Alette said, equally angry. She knew how her daughter hated being penned up. Isabelle spent her days out of doors, rain or shine.
    “I will run away,” was the defiant reply.
    “And where would you go?” her mother demanded scornfully. “To your precious Richard? Even if he were willing to shelter you, Belle, what would become of you? You should end your days an unpaid servant in your brother’s house. Without this estate, you have no dowry. For now you have your youth, and you have beauty. True, you are not the ideal woman so fashionable today. You are too big a girl. But there might be some man of your brother’s acquaintance who would be willing to have you for his leman. Your hair and skin are without flaw. Still, would you choose that kind of a life over being the lady of Langston? No.” Alette held up her hand as Belle opened her mouth to reply. “Say not another word to me, Isabelle. I will leave you now to think about everything we have discussed this evening. I know you will come to a sensible solution.” Unbarring and opening the door, she went through it back into the Great Hall. Alette locked her daughter’s chamber behind her before joining the two knights and the priest by one of the fires.
    “Sit, madame,” Hugh said graciously. “Is the lady Isabelle calmer now, and over her initial shock? I realize it cannot havebeen easy for so sensitive a female to have learned of her father’s