The Passionate Brood Read Online Free PDF Page B

gleam of hope, Johanna caught at her brother’s arm.
    “Oh, Richard, can’t you persuade him—”
    Richard shook his head regretfully. For the first time he wished that he had tried to keep on better terms with his father. “Not I, my dear. Nor Henry.” Untouched by the issue that absorbed them all, John kept importuning him to look at his new dagger, and as Richard took it he ruined the boy’s hair and suggested good-naturedly, “Try John here. He has the royal favour.”
    “You’re right. He almost rivals Rosamund!” broke out Henry bitterly.
    They all knew that jealousy was his particular demon and that ever since Ann’s brother, the Dauphin, had been crowned prospective King of France, Henry had been sensitive about the insecurity of his own title, but the unexpected outburst shocked them to silence. Richard swung round, the little jewelled knife clenched in his hand. “Shut your foul mouth!” he muttered threateningly.
    “Why?” argued Henry, with cool disregard for his mother’s feelings. “Doesn’t everybody know the King is at Woodstock?”
    As if by accident Robin moved between them, and Eleanor tapped angrily on the floor with her scarlet shoe. “Henry! Richard!” she cried, with weary disgust. “Must you be for ever snarling like curs over every stale bone?”
    The moment of tension was snapped by the unexpected appearance of Blondel. He had found his way to their aerie because the whole place was seething with news which he felt that they should know—and which none of the other pages dared tell them. “The King has come home,” he warned breathlessly, from the stair head.
    “From Woodstock? Already?” exclaimed Ann, rising involuntarily in a cascade of scattered silks.
    “I must go and see the servants,” said the Queen, who always remembered to order a bath and the special dishes that he loved. But Blondel barred her way, white-faced and resolute. “Do not go down now, Madam,” he begged. “He is in one of his rages. He…”
    “What is it, Blondel?” she asked quietly, steadying him by her own perfect composure.
    He dared not look at her. “This woman they call Rosamund has been murdered,” he blurted out.
    “Murdered!” The sinister word was echoed round the room.
    “At last!” added Eleanor, triumphantly.
    It was Ann, the quick-witted, who implored her to be more careful what she said. Her own trembling mouth was half hidden by horror-stricken hands.
    “How?” Henry wanted to know.
    “Poisoned, Sir.”
    Young John, eaten by morbid curiosity, pulled at his new friend’s sleeve. “But hadn’t he hidden her in some cunning bower?”
    “I heard people down in the hall talking about it. It seems some malicious person had the wit to unravel a thread from the silk of the embroidery she was carrying—just as you might from those silks milady Ann has let fall.”
    “How damned ingenious!” exclaimed John.
    “So ingenious that people will probably say it must have been by order of another woman,” speculated Henry.
    “Someone who was jealous?” suggested Ann.
    “They’re saying—” began Blondel; then stopped short, abashed at finding himself the centre of their interest. It seemed fantastic that he—the new page—should already be playing a role in this Plantagenet drama. He went down on one knee with his burning face hidden against the scarlet of the Queen’s skirts. “They are saying that you yourself had most cause, Madam. Some malicious gossip has spread it all over the town—” he reported shakily, and was thankful when a concerted murmur of indignation stemmed his words.
    “He will send her back to Salisbury for this!” wailed Johanna.
    “Now, by God’s heart, hasn’t he insulted her enough?” cried Richard, making for the stairs. But the Queen herself was there before him. She winced at the muttered guardroom oath with which he cursed his father, but countered it with laughter. It was not the first time she had averted something approaching