Page 7 of Feathers in the Wind
‘I saw what happened,’ she said. ‘Come to my stillroom and I’ll dress it for you.’
The door to the stillroom stood open and he paused in the doorway as she gestured for him to enter, saying she would return shortly with water and cloths.
The little room had once, in times long past he supposed, probably served the household as a chapel. Still visible behind the shelves and the neatly packed jars and pots, faded, peeling murals of biblical scenes could still be discerned. Sunlight, breaking through the grey clouds, streamed brokenly through the mullioned glass of the high window and fell on the bench, illuminating briefly the figure of Lazarus rising from the dead on the wall above her.
‘Sit down and I will see to your hand.’
Adam started and turned to see Perdita in the doorway. He’d not heard her return.
He pulled a rueful face as he perched on one of the tall stools she used at her bench. ‘I swear those pikes must have last seen service in the days of King Richard.’
She set the pitcher and cloths down on the table and busied herself selecting a pot from the row on the shelf above the bench.
‘Quite likely.’ She found the pot she sought and turned to look at him. ‘Simon pulled them off the wall of the great hall. Now let’s see to that hand.’
In the few days he’d been at Preswood, he’d had little opportunity to speak with Perdita. In the company of her kin, she kept herself apart, a silent, watchful presence as Simon and Bess chattered. He caught Joan glancing at her every now and then and wondered what it was about Perdita Gray that prompted the frown that creased his aunt’s brow.
She pulled the matronly and unbecoming cap from her head and threw it on the bench in a crumpled heap as she unbuttoned her cuffs and rolled up her sleeves. She had tied her hair roughly back from her face in a loose knot and strands of nut-brown hair fell around her oval face.
Obediently he held out his hand, wincing at her gentle but sure touch. She glanced up anxiously and he smiled.
‘It’s fine,’ he said, earning a small, quick smile from this strangely silent woman.
Perdita cleaned the cut across his palm, extricating several splinters of wood. He looked down at the glossy brown head, bent over in concentration.
‘Ouch,’ he said as her probing touched a nerve.
She looked up and shook her head. She had a perfect oval face, high cheekbones and large brown eyes, but her eyes had a wariness to them. Perdita Gray did not trust people easily and he had yet to win that trust.
‘For a man who professes to be a soldier, you’re not very brave,’ she said.
‘You have a deft touch, Mistress Gray,’ Adam replied.
‘My father was an apothecary,’ she said. ‘He let me help him. Had I been born a boy, I would have liked to follow his profession. It was my misfortune to be a girl. There, you’ll live,’ she announced. ‘Now I’ll just dress that cut.’
She unstoppered the jar she had chosen and sniffed the contents. ‘This may sting a little,’ she said, ‘but it is most efficacious in healing wounds.’
‘You’re a Londoner from your voice,’ Adam observed.
She looked up at him with surprise in her eyes. ‘I am, although there is not enough gold in this country to ever induce me back into that accursed city.’
‘Why is that?’
‘I left my past behind me when I came to Preswood two years ago, Master Coulter.’ She wrenched a clean cloth into strips of bandage and bound his hand. ‘I thought I would be safe here but now there is all this talk…tell me, will this war reach us here?’
‘No one is untouched by a civil war, Mistress Gray.’
She sat facing him, her hands folded in her lap. ‘And you, Adam Coulter? What side will you take, or are you a mercenary who would sell his sword to the highest bidder?’
Adam felt an unexpected heat rise to his face. ‘I can’t deny that I fought in the German wars because it was employment, but if I choose to take up my sword in my own land, it will not be for that reason.’
‘And what is your inclination?’
‘I don’t know.’ He glanced up at Lazarus. ‘I only know that the German wars taught me that in a civil war you can’t stay neutral. No matter how much it appals me, a choice will have to be made.’ He brought his gaze back to meet her eyes again, wishing he could read the thoughts behind them, but no doubt years of long practice had given Perdita Gray a carefully controlled mask. He wondered what had happened to her in London that she had sought sanctuary in Preswood.
He continued, almost despite himself, voicing the thoughts that had been clashing in his head since he arrived back in England. ‘God alone knows I didn’t come home to take up arms in my own country against my own countrymen. I want no part of it.’ His tone sounded harsh with emotion, even to his own ears.
‘You’re training Simon’s militia precisely for that reason,’ Perdita pointed out.
